umm..you mightve gotten an email from brandon...but w/e he sent us this one...
Hola...¿Cómo andan?
So I wrote out this beast of an email, and then our internet place lost power or
something...all the computers just died. GAH! So let's try this again...
My first area- Ingeniero Huergo. My trainer/companion- Elder Vance Boyer.
Huergo is a sweet little town of about 2,000 (so they tell me), with a tiny city
bit in the middle and then chacras all surrounding. The people are pretty laid
back, which is chill, and they all have been pretty nice thus far.
Things that I must address that I answered poorly on the Christmas phone call (I
decided to actually pay attention to these things after the call)-
1) Race- when I said there was a decent number of European looking folk for me
to somewhat blend in, that was a dirty lie. I don't know what I was thinking.
Maybe I was thinking of Buenos Aires or Neuquén...either way, pretty much
everyone in Huergo is dark.
2) The houses- Cement and brick houses. nobody has grass lawns, either, except a
couple really nice houses and this plaza area in the town.
So, dogs wander the streets here like cats do in the States. It's odd. I think
it's safe to say that they don't watch The Price is Right down here, or else Bob
Barker's advice wouldn't be so terribly ignored.
Two times, now, my companion and I have walked by dogs and he gets by fine, but
when I follow, the dog pounces! The first one was a pretty big dog, but he only
caught my shirt and ripped a little piece. I was more in shock than anything
else. The second occurence had a little dog that barely bit my ankle, but he
didn't make a scratch or anything. That was really just more confusing than
anything. In all honesty, nothing has really come of the dog fiascos, but they
are fun to tell about (calm down, Mother).
Life is so much better with luggage! Apparently a few people from my group still
haven't received their luggage! It was terrible to be without it for the 4 or 5
days I was without it, but longer!? Poor people!
Christmas- It's all about La Buena Noche. It's kind of weird to welcome in
Christmas with fireworks and what-not, but it was pretty sweet. Everyone has
those fireworks they don´t let you buy in Oregon, so they go nuts with them.
Sweet stuff. We got together as the Elders in our zone (10ish of us?). We ate a
pig. Umm...eating an animal and being able to look it in the eye as you do
it...weird. In general, Christmas without all the commercialism is kind of
bizarre.
New Year- So, a week after midnight fireworks, they do it again! Brilliant! They
have these things that are kind of like little hot air balloons, so they light
them on fire and fly off, but then consume themselves in flames in the air,
which is pretty exciting. We were with another companionship in Villa Regina for
New Years, and the people in their neighborhood had some sweet fireworks.
As for the actual missionary work- it's good stuff! We're teaching this one lady
(Ana Maria) right now who is the super cool. We talked (well, my companion
mostly talked...I followed and pitched in a couple times) and pretty much ended
up teaching the whole Restoration lesson to her. Right as he started to talk
about Joseph Smith, she stopped him to show him that she had goosebumps and felt
something really good. Way cool. We found out that she had some other
missionaries come by that she wasn't a fan of, but we changed her opinions, and
she gave us a bag of peaches as a gift for making her feel good. Woo! Then we
went back to teach about The Plan of Salvation. Her daughter joined for part of
the time and was way chill, as well. This lesson also went really well, with her
again telling us that she felt something very good about all this, and she sent
us off with Pan Dulce. Woo! We're teaching some others, but I feel she is the
coolest to share about.
By the way, Pan Dulce is EVERYWHERE with the holiday season. Every time we stop
by a member home, they throw pan dulce at us, and we've received a few as gifts.
So we have 3 little cake things sitting in our apartment waiting to be eaten. So
much pan dulce!
It's been pretty toasty here the last few days (35C...90ish?). With a tight
collar and long black pants, the heat kills! That´s definitely going to take
some getting used to. Also, I have never appreciated fans so much. Mmmm...I love
our fan. Everytime we come home, the fan and I are best friends.
Did I mention that we ran out of purified water this week for a couple days?
BAH! Know what´s lame? Deciding you are thirsty, and then boiling water to
purify it for your weak, spoiled stomach, then throwing the water in the fridge
or freezer for about an hour for it to cool down unil you an finaly drink it.
BAH! haha...oh, the adventures.
Our apartment is actually pretty nice. This whole 'no carpet' bit is kind of
odd, though.
Qué más, qué más...they sell milk in bags here. Weird, but something about
the milk is delicious. It's 1.5%...I don't know...but it's delicious. Some of
that action with the rip-off Frosted Flakes and you're in heaven.
Oh, we have this mother-daughter team out here that makes us lunch every day,
which is pretty darn cool. (Hermana Rosita and Hermana Miriam. That's right.
Rosita.) They kind of remind me of Grandma and Charo. It´s funny how many of
the things are things I've had from mom or grandma, but Hna Rosa puts beef
instead of chicken (I guess that´s Argentina for ya!). Oh! She made the
spaghetti stuff...tallarin? Whatever that stuff is...but with beef. I laughed a
little inside when I saw it.
We were at a member's house and their son (tiene...14 años?) whipped out a Guns
'n' Roses CD and asked if I knew them. I had a good little laugh. United States
music is fairly common down here. Amusing.
I'm not sure how I'll be doing pictures yet, so...be patient.
Anyway, that's the life. Castillano is coming along...I can understand some
people (some people talk ridiculously slurred!), but I'm seeing progress in my
understanding, which is the big goal, right?
I hope everything is going well back home. What'd you decide to name my
replacement? C'mon Paco!
At this point, I'm just killing time as my companion finishes his
email...hmmm...
...I really hope we get to go get groceries...Oh! So I have the most amazing
luck. Since both Christmas and New Years have fallen on my first two Mondays, my
first to Prep Days have been SUPER Prep Days (instead of having to go back to
work at 6pm, we get the whole day off. Woo!)
Okay...that´s it! Yo he dicho. |
hey friends of brandon, well, elder decker,
this is his sister aubrey and i will be updating you on whats going on with brandon...if for some reason you didnt know, he's on his mission, to Argentina. He was at the MTC for 2months and departed for argentina on time on December 18th. He flew from Utah to Atlanta, then Atlanta to Argentina, arriving in Buenos Aires on December 19th then flew to Neuquen(WHOA ITS THE SAME SPELLED BACKWARDS...sorry 'bout that, back to the message)on December 20th. Unfortunately, his luggage was delayed in Atlanta so he couldnt change out of his smelly suit until christmas! Now, he is living in Huergo which is a VERY small town(population 2,000)east of Neuquen. In order to get there he had to take a bus by himself, the thing is, down there the buses didnt have a sign saying "Elder Decker here is your mission", at least not in english. He had to go up to a stranger and ask her how he'd know where his stop was, his spanish is descent but she rambled on very quickly so he just nodded and thanked her for the information(the "right...." gesture. Luckily for him, when the bus got to his stop she called him up and "Cuidado!" he was off. His companion is elder ...well, he's from idaho, something like "Boyer" but thats not important. Brandon called on Christmas and he seemed pretty happy and content, but he still needs your loving! you can send him letters at:
Elder Brandon Todd Decker
Argentina Neuquen Mission
POB 30150
Salt Lake City UT 84130-0150
USA
the mail you send there will be given to the MTC(im guessing) but then they send it in one big pouch each friday down to Brandon so you dont have to pay for the letter to go all the way down to argetina,
WARNING!!!: for that adress the mail cannot include money, travelers checks, stamps, credit/debot cards, phone cards, food products, or photographs(paper copies of photographs may be included)so just documented letters ONLY.
IF YOU NEED(i mean NEEED) to send him a package you can send it to
Elder Brandon Todd Decker
Argentina Neuquen Mission
Zapla 24
8300 Neuquen
Neuquen
ARGENTINA
the reason that I'm emphasizing the NEED is because he has to pay for the package, so if you need to, please make it small or consider putting a little bit of cash in it.
and you could also use www.dearelder.com , go there and find "Argentina Neuquen Mission" click on it, and click on "write a letter" and then write away, for his name put Elder Brandon Todd Decker. Since letters take about 3 weeks to get to him by mail this is a easier and quickererer(err....) and free option. My personal opinion though is to keep the old hispanic mail lady with a job, but Dear Elder is probably the safer track since it's also quarenteed to get to him.
Eventually he will also get an email set up there and i will display that once we get it.
As for brandons diet he says its pretty simple since most food is similiar to peruvian food, christmas Eve they had pizza! but apparently they also had a pig...not your normal ham, the head was still on it, kinda gross to him, vegetarian? nah.
well, thats all i can think of for right now, if i think of anything else, I'll post more...
-aubrey(AKA) Brandon Decker's little Sister
These are some pictures he sent us from the MTC:
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