12.19.11

Hello over there!

Merry Christmas!!! Its hard to believe that it is already christmas huh? Man does time fly. First of all I would like to express my feelings right now about an email that I received. YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ahhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am seriously soooooooo excited right now! and I think you know why!! Heather is going to Jerusalem!!!!! I couldn't be more happy and excited for her!! Just following in her favorite sister footsteps ehhh? haha Man do I wish that I could experience Jerusalem again. What an incredible experience. I was literally jumping for joy over here when I read the email. Im sure everyone was looking at me like a freak. esta bien I am a freak right? haha.

Well this week was better. Thanks for all of your love and support and prayers. They have def been felt. I am doing better. That doesn't mean that it is easy but I have really been turning to my heavenly father and the sciptures all lot for comfort and help in this time. I realize that this isn't going to last forever and there is something I have to learn from it. Like dad told me, I am hear to help her learn the gospel and she is here to help me with the spanish. I totally agree. I got a call from our mission president on Saturday and he was asking how we were doing and how I was doing with the mini and all he said was that it is my responsibility to be an example to her by being happy and sharing my testimony. She is so new in the gospel I am always so scared that I might say something or do something wrong.

Well we are still visiting with this inactive family a lot. They are wanting there son to get baptized so this past week we had an awesome lesson asking them why they want him to be baptized and the importance of being examples as parents for their children and how the gospel is for the family. Well at the end of the lesson they told us to were going to come to church and guess what they showed up!! The whole family!! This might not seem like something special but for me this was huge. It has been several years since they have been to church and they showed up yesterday with the whole family and stayed for classes after. Man was I smiling so big all during church. there are so many people that say they are going to come and then dont show up so when they actually do show up it is the best thing in the world!! SOme of their neighbors showed up to. Yesterday was a good week with attendence in church. we had 5 investigators! yay!

Well here comes another new challenge in my path pretty soon. When president called me on saturday he said that they have been talking a little bit with our branch president about the area here and they feel like they need to make some changes and they are going to be changing our areas. In our branch there is my comp and I and a pair of elders. Well beginning of this next transfer we will be working in the elders area and they will now be in our area. It is basically like doing another whitewash because we dont know anything about their area. oooh
how fun ehh? and it stinks because we have all the awesome members in our area right now. but whatever there is always a good reason right? I am doing good. Just taking it one day at a time and really relying on my savior more than anything and the scripture man do I love the scriptures so much. They provide so much comfort and help me so much. What a blessing it is so have scriptures. I feel blessed to have this opportunity to share my testimony of our Savior Jesus Christ at this time because he is the reason for the season. It is so great to be able to really focus on that this christmas. We really dont have any plans for Christmas. I am hoping that someone will invite us over for something. haha we will see. and if not i guess we will have to figure something out with us two. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and always remember the reason for the season. love you lots and I am constantly praying for you. I still havent recieved the Christmas package but hopefully sometime this week it will show up. I am crossing my fingers.

love,
Hermana Van Wagenen

p.s. Thanks sis Greenlaw for the letter. I seriously was so excited to read it. I dont have time right now to right back but dont you worry a letter will be coming back. I am so excited because I know that you literally understand everything that I am going through. haha

12.12.11

Hey there!

It sounds like everyone is busy right now taking finals/ getting ready for Christmas! haha I loved the pic of Grandma and Grandpa on Santas lap. I almost died. How funny. I loved it!!!!

Well as I sit here and try to think about my week not a lot of exciting stories come to mind. So it looks like this weeks letter is going to be a boring one. haha Last monday after writing home we went to a members house to hang out and make Chipas!!! have you ever heard of chipas? They are these small balls of cheese bread! mmmm so yummy! i was really wanting to learn how to make them so when I am home I will be able to make them. They are delicious but who knows if I will be able to re make them.

Recently we have been working on going through the list of members. Our branch here is obera has over 1,000 members but only about 50 that are active. Sad huh? so the president gave us the responsibility of finding these people and find out what happened basically. so this week was a week of finding some of these people. but man is it a lot harder to find address here than in the states. some of the address literally say the house next to the blue store. hahaha. ridiculous!! but we did find a few members. We found this sweet young family who have 3 kids and they actually have a son who is 9 who they want him to get baptized! the only problem is that they dont want to go to church! uhhh PROBLEM!!! apparently the dad got offended several years ago when they were rebuilding the church building and they didnt ask him (who is a construction worker) to help with building it. so basically he got offended and stopped going. It is ridiculous who many people/members there are here who dont go to church because they got offended by some crazy thing. the thing that I always says is ¨"we go to church for God, not for the members!" so we are trying to work with this family to get them active and baptize their son!!!! pray for us they we can know how to help them!

Sadly we were not able to watch the christmas devotional because they couldnt get it to work! how was it? I want to hear about it. Man the sun here is just getting stronger and stronger each and every day! I just keep thinking about you guys enjoy nice cold winter and i am kind of jealous! I seriously used to love summer before my mission and now in this moment it is on my hate list. haha but everyone keeps telling me that here is this area the heat isnt that bad compared to other areas in the mission. so i guess i just have to be grateful to be here during summer. I am not one to ask for help much but I am needing your prayers more than every right now! This situation is a lot harder than I was thinking. I literally feel like I am here doing the work alone and since I am a missionary I need a companion and she is just hear to be with me. Last night we didnt have appts or anything so we ended up having to knock doors/talk to people outside and she wouldnt talk to anyone. She was literally in silence the whole night!! I am trying to be strong but man is missionary work difficult to do alone. There is a reason that we have companions to support each other and switch off doing contacts. She keeps telling me that I seem mad or sad. haha but its more that I am stressed and I need her help. She just doesnt seem to understand and the whole language thing doesnt help. ya I understand the language but people have to be patient with me and speak a little slower and at time repeat words or explain words that i dont know. Well she just speaks super fast always and get annoyed when I dont understand what she is saying. She just expects that I know the whole spanish language but man is there a ton to learn! I dont want to sound like I am complaining because it isnt that it is just a very hard time right now! but there is a reason for it right? There is always something to learn from every hard situation.

Well I love you lots thanks for all of your support and letters. It is very much appreciated!!!!!! Have a wonderful week! Love you all lots!!!!

Love,
Hna Van Wag

photo 1: random pic of Hna Green and I.

Photo 2: not a super great pic but its Hna Green and I with our awesome hats for summer. haha

Christmas letters.

Don't forget to send Kara some Christmas love!! I'm sure she would absolutely LOVE to get Christmas cards and letters from everyone!!

The mission home address is:

Misio'n Argentina Resistencia

Entre Rios 435

3500 Resistencia, Chaco

Argentina

Also, dearelder.com still works. It's free and will be printed out for her, like a letter.

Feliz Navidad!

12.5.11

Hi Family!

Well I have to start my email by giving a big huge shout out to the coolest/smartest brother in law in the whole world!! CONGRATULATIONS BRYAN!!!!!! you are such an inspiration and I am so happy for you guys! I am so happy that you guys are going to be in San Fran. You will be close!!! yay!!!

Man does it seem like right as things seem to be comfortable and good in the mission some big huge change comes in the way. Well we are going to back track a little bit to last tuesday.

Tuesday: was our p-day. It was a normal day. We wrote home and then had district meeting and chilled the rest of the day. Then at night we had a branch mission activity that we planned. We just played some fun unity games and gave a short spiritual message at the end. It turned out way good. Well as we were cleaning up from the activity (us and the elders) our district leader recieved the awaited call around 930 from the zone leaders about tranfers. Well we found out that my wonderful comp Hermana Green was headed to Posadas (about 2 hours from here, which is close!) and that I was going to be recieving a mini missionary but they had no idea who it was yet or when she would get here. They basically told me that I need to call a member that night (it was already 1030) to ask them if I could hang out with them/stay with them until I had a comp. well i called a member a luckily she was super awesome and said it wasnt a problem and that I could hang out with here.

Wed: we went to the bus station at 9 in the morning where I dropped hermana green off to head to her new area and Dora (the member) met up with us. I then went with Dora and hung out with her and her family all day on wednesday. It was actually really strange to just sit in the house of a member all day because we dont do that! haha Well it was starting to get late. It was around 830 when I still hadnt heard any information so i asked Dora if she could go with me to my apt so I could get stuff to sleep in because it was looking like I was going to be sleeping in her house. So we went to my apt and as we were on our way back to her house 930ish I got a call from my district leader saying that my companion was at the bus station waiting for me! (ummm why didnt you tell me forever ago that you knew who my comp was and that she was on her way!?!?!?!) so we then went straight to the bus to pick her up and finally got back to our apt at 11ish. Man what a day!

Well the rest of the week has been a pretty normal week. My new comp is Hermana Vera. She is from Formosa (which is one of the ¨states¨that is a part of our mission. She was baptized 2 weeks ago!!!! yes 2 weeks! So basically she doesnt know anything!! I think she knows who joseph smith is. haha I am not going to lie this is worse than training. At least when you train you are with someone that went to the mtc and knows what it is like to be a missionary. She knows that we visit with people and thats about it. This morning I woke up and she told me that around 1 in the morning she called home on our cell phone and talked to her family for a while! ahhhh!!!!! Just as things seem to be going good in the mission God puts another challenge in our way. huh? I just hope that I can be a good example and teach her correctly what the mission is and have it be a good experience for her. I am not going to lie I am feeling super solo right now because basically it is my responsibility every single thing we do and I dont have a lot of support as far as a companion. Man am I realizing how great it is to have a real companion to help in the work. But I guess there is a reason for this right? God put this challenge in my way for a reason and there is always something that he wants us to learn from them. There is so much that I still have to learn here in the mission but its a good thing I still have a lot of time huh?

so I celebrated the 9 months in the mission and with that I basically had a child huh? I basically consider this like training. even though this is going to be a challenging 6 weeks I know that the lord put this is my path for a reason and that he will provide a way to help me do this. I am so grateful for this gospel and I truly am grateful for the things he puts in my path because I know that the will help me grow in so many ways. Bring them on! Thanks for all of your support because it is def appreciated and very needed as a missionary. haha I thank my heavenly father every day for the amazing family that he has given me because I know without you guys this wouldnt be possible. I love you guys a lot! I hope you have a wonderful week. I am hear in Argentina to call people to repentance. What a great opportunity! :)

love you lots,

Hna Van Wag

11.28.11

hi family!

Well it sounds like you guys had a fun thanksgiving together with the whole family! I am glad to hear that! Its actually nice to be out of the country where they dont even celebrate thanksgiving because it didnt really affect me. I didnt have to see families together celebrating it. I think christmas is going to be a little bit harder but it will be good. My comp and I decided to celebrate a little and we made feather hats like we used to in elementary school and we ate a pie type thing while wearing our feather thanksgiving hats. haha we are super cool right? haha. oh ps Argentina decided to have another holiday yesterday for I have no idea what, so thats why today is our p-day.

Well this week was basically a week of not sleeping I am basically dead!

First night: So you can tell that you are def not in the United States when you have cockroaches crawling on your feet the the middle of the night. The other night we were in bed had already said our prayers and we were just laying in bed around 10:50 at night and all of a sudden I heard a death scream from my comp on the top bunk and she is screaming at me to hand her the flashlight. I immediately jump out of bed and run to turn on the lights. We didnt see anything but just stood there in fear when all of a sudden she picked up her pillow are we see a cockroach the size of my thumb (stinking huge!) under her pillow. She had a broom in her hands and I had the raid cockroach spray in mine. It then jumped off of her bed onto my desk and to the floor and I just attacked the thing with spray and just murdered it. We were then pretty much grossed out the rest of the night and didnt even want to lay in our beds. I literaly am scared to go to bed at night now! because that it at least the 20th cockroach we have found in our apt. I seriously want to throw up. so disgusting!

Next night: Well I think I am pretty much been cursed. Remember how last week I told you about have to teach the relief society lesson and I was talking about how as missionarys we are super on the spot. Well late saturday night the branch president came to me and asked me to give a 15 minute talk the next day in sacrament meeting. 15 minutes!! ahhhh with no time to prepare. and I am not one that can just get up and start talking so basically we were up all night trying to prepare my talk and then translate it into spanish.. (I have an awesome comp who stayed up and helped me!)

Last night: Basically it is a million degrees and I am seriously dying! The sun is literally right above us and so close. and you better believe that we do not have air conditioning or a fan in our apt so basically our apartment is an oven. I am in a constent sweat so basically we just lay in our beds at night sweating and cannot sleep. so sunday night we literally just layed there till 1 in the morning because we couldnt sleep. I dont know if I will survive it is really hard to have energy to work throughout the day. I really hope I can survive this. It has just started and I am already just praying for winter to be here. so if you have any thing that can help me survive summer anything would be welcomed! :)

but I promise there are good things about Argentina too its not all bad! haha Sadly we let our investigator Senor Morales go because he basically stopped progessing and there isnt much more we can do. One of the youth in the ward had been inviting his friend to church for the past 4 weeks and he finally came to church this past sunday. It is so cool to see the youth being missionarys like that! I love it! Man it makes such a difference for us as missionarys when the members and doing their part and inviting their friends. I am so proud of you guys for inviting a family to do the church tour. You guys are the best missionarys. I hope everything works out with that. Let me know how it goes. Well I got to go! Love you all lots and hope you have a wonderful week. Until next week...

con amor,

Hermana Van Wag

11.21.11

Hi!!!

I am not going to lie. Its really weird to say Happy Thanksgiving here because first it doesnt seem like it should be thanksgiving right now and second they dont celebrate it here so there is nothing to show it would be thanksgiving but since it is november I am assuming thanksgiving is this week! My comp and I are wanting to do some sort of thanksgiving dinner but the truth is that there is nothing here that we could make that is like what we eat for thanksgiving we might just make mashed potatoes or something. haha

Well this week was kind of a sad week for us because Senor Morales once again did not come to church so basically we are just thinking that we have to let him go which is sad but we have been teaching him for so long that now there just isnt really much that we can do. Man its hard to let go of investigators when they are super awesome but I guess that is part of the mission huh? Last thursday the relief society president asked me if I could teach the lesson in relief society. ahhh Man I am not one that enjoys teaching lessons at church and let alone when it is in a different language and with little time to prepare. but I did it! haha it was interesting and I think I just ended up just asking a lot of questions and trying to get the members to talk. Then I showed the movie small and simple things. Have you seen that video? its super cool. you should watch it!! basically as missionaries you are always on the spotlight. we are always the ones call on five minutes before sacrament meeting to give a talk in church. ahhh being a missionary I am realizing it very much out of my comfort zone but I think it is good for me.

I am contining to do good and working hard. I am so grateful for this gospel and for this time that I have to devote to the Lord. What an awesome experience it is. ahh the guy is telling me they are closing. gtg. love you all lots! have a wonderful week together!!!!!

Love,

Hna Van Wagenen

11.14.11

hey there!
How is everyone doing? well this week was kind of an interesting week. On wednesday our zone leaders decided they wanted to do divisions with us sisters. ya I am not going to lie I was a little scared for that. They told us that they were going to come here in our area and one of us sisters would go with the zone leaders and the other would go with the district leader and his comp. I have never done this before but it actually ended up being a very cool experience for me. I got put with the zone leaders which was kind of intimidating but they really showed me how to be excited and enjoy the work because sometimes each day is kind of the same and it gets kind of repetetive but they really showed me how to stay excited and it doesnt even matter if people reject us because our message is so important and if someone doesnt want to hear it that is their disadvantage.

This week was pretty good. I was pretty sad though because out investigator Senor Morales told us pretty much for sure that him and his wife would be coming to church on sunday. so we excitedly waited on sunday morning for him and he didnt ever show up. man did it make me pretty sad. I just feel like we have been doing so much to help him. We are constantly thinking about him and what he needs and so it lets me down so much when they dont go through with things they say they are going to do. I just pray that this sunday he will finally come. Man there are times in the mission that are really difficult and really sad when you have investigators who have so much potential and are really awesome and then they reject you because they said that their pastor said that they cant talk to us but at the same time there are some really awesome moments in the mission that make everything worth it. I have really learned to turn to the scriptures lately. I have been reading the Liahona/ensign from october about the book of mormon and realized how amazing the book of mormon is and what a power that it has. I have really learned during my mission to turn to the book of mormon because everytime I do I always seem to recieve that comfort that i need. if you dont read the book of mormon daily i suggest that you do it because it is councel from a prophet and i really do believe that it helps so much through the day. i know that the book of mormon is the word of god and was so happy to hear that you guys have been giving out book of mormons! how awesome you are all super missionarys!!! love you all lots and lots! you guys are the best ever!!! have an awesome week!!!!

love,
Hna Van Wag

11.7.11

Hola Familia!!

This past week was a great week. On Friday we took a 7 hour bus to resistencia with a bus full of missionaries. It was pretty crazy but fun to be with other missionaries. When we got to Resistencia they split us all up and sent us off to different hermanas apartments who are serving in Resistencia. There were 12 hermanas sleeping in one small apartment basically just people all of the floor. It was literally crazy but fun. Then on saturday morning we went to the church and listened to Elder Christofferson and his wife. It was such an amazing experience. I feel so lucky to be here at this time because it is not very often that someone from the 12 comes to our mission and for me I felt like it was the perfect time to come. Almost at the half way point of my mission to get me excited. Its so hard to explain the feeling that I felt but there was such an incredible spirit in the room as he walked in and as he shared his testimony. It just was another strong witness to me that what I am doing is correct and that this is without a doubt the church of Jesus Christ. We also had the opportunity to shake his hand. So AWESOME! It was also super awesome to see all of my friends from the mission. The best part for me was seeing my mtc comp and some of the people from my mtc district! oh what a wonderful weekend!!

The missionary work is still a little slow at this time in our area. We are working hard with our friend Senor Morales who is the man in the wheel chair to get him to church. This is like the 6th week that he hasnt come. Ahhh! I dont know what to do! When we teach him he loves it so much and he says that he knows the things we are teaching him are true and even last thursday he invited his friend to come listen to us and during the whole lesson he was teaching his friend the things. It was so awesome to see him teaching and inviting his friends to listen to us. but the whole coming to church thing has been a problem. Hopefully this sunday we can see a miracle happen! We need your prayers!!! :) Well I dont have a lot of time so its a short letter this week but basically i love you all. Hopefully you have a wonderful week. I am so grateful for all of you and your support during my mission. YOu are awesome!!!

Love,

Hna Van Wag

P.S. I recieved the letters in spanish from the sisters in the ward. I absolutely love them!!! Thanks so much!

10.31.11

Hey there!
Happy Halloween! umm I pretty much died when I saw Laurens costume. Stinking crazy head! hahaha Ky looks so stinkin cute as a bum, I love Heathers awesome indian outfit and mckay is probably the cutest cow ever well of course up there with Lauren! I am loving the cute halloween costumes! I am just wondering where is Amys outfit? haha So pretty much Halloween doesnt exist here. Its super crazy to me that Halloween is today because I am so used to seeing halloween things in every store I walk by in the United States but here there is nothing. The only reason I knew that it was Halloween because I looked at the date. so basically Im dressing up as a missionary for this special holiday! :) haha creative right?

Well I am super happy to say that we found an awesome family this week! We realized that going around knocking doors has not been super sucessful for us as far as finding people so we figured out a new way. We found out that our branch here in Obera has over a 1000 members but with only maybe 50 active. What happened you might ask. ya I have no idea! Some disaster it seems to me. So we have decided to go through the list of members and start visiting these members and recieving references from them. Well this past week we started this adventure but one of the things about here in Argentina is adresses to houses are not very clear or they have a number to to the house but it doesnt say the number anywhere on the house so basically we have to ask everyone around this area who this family is. but through this we have an excuse to talk to random people and share with them too. Well we asked this family where one of the members lived and we ended up going in their house and teaching them and I was so shocked that both the parents were there and most of the kids while we were there teaching. This was the first time in my mission where it has been like that because usually its just one person that will sit and listen. So for me this was pretty much a miracle. My comp and I were pretty stocked. So we are really trying to focus on this family and what they need. It is the parents and they have 5 children. That is also something not super common so have a whole family with the parents not separated. So we will see what happens with this family!

Well this Saturday I am super excited about!!! We are heading to Resistencia which is about 6 hours away by bus and we will be meeting up with everyone in the mission so listen to a prophets voice!! Elder Christofferson is coming the the Argentina Resistencia mission to speak to us and we are all pretty stocked!! This is the first and probably only time that we will get together with the whole mission like this so I am super excited to see all my friends from the mtc and old comps and to hear from Elder Christofferson!!

Well that was pretty much my week. Things are going well. Learning and growing everyday. Man am I learning that the Lord really does know us. This whole senior comp has not been super easy for me. We all know that I have never been a leader type person but being senior comp I am forced into taking charge and being the leader and going up to people to talk to them. Apparently the Lord wanted to take me out of my comfort zone because man has this been out of my comfort zone but I am grateful for it and the things that I am learning. The mission is crazy but super awesome! haha Well I love you all lots! Have a wonderful week and enjoy your Halloween! Send me some of your candy! haha jk

Lots of Love,
Hna Van Wag

10.24.11

Hola!
como estan? Total bien aca en Obera. We are still in a pretty slow
moment right now in the missionary work. We basically have one
investigator that is truly progressing but he still hasnt come to
church yet. Its super frustrating. I am realizing that I think this
area might actually be harder than my first area. There is literally a
church on every corner here and its not just catholics. I am realizing
that I actually like to talk to the catholics because most of the
catholics are catholic because of tradition but dont actually go to
church or anything. but here there is a ton more religions and the
people are super super devoted to their religion and believe that
their church is the true church and dont want anything to do with
other religions. yes its pretty awesome! so i am basically realizing
that I am happy when I find a catholic person. haha

So our one investigator that we have is Senor Morales. He was a
reference of one of the members and he is basically the best
investigator one could have. He absolutely loves our visits and is
always waiting outside for us to come. The problem is that he has a
sickness and he is in a wheelchair so this basically impedes him from
going to church because he can only leave and go if his wife drives
him and goes with him. It has been about 4 weeks and he still hasnt
come. We are just praying that one day they will come to church
because I know that as soon as they come they will love it and know!
He is reading the book of mormon every morning and just loves the
things that we teach him because he says that we teach him things that
he never knew before. We are just hoping and praying that they will
come to church because i could totally see a baptism in the future.
Other than him we are pretty slow but its ok I have faith that things
will pick up again.

This past weekend we had a visit from President Hayman and his wife.
We had interviews with him and they took all of us out to ice cream.
it was a fun little visit. and everytime they come they tell us how
much they love obera and apparently obera is the prettiest city in the
mission. it really is a pretty cute city! well i am litterally out of
time. but i love you all lots and hope you have a wonderful week!!!
until next week!!

love,
Hermana Van Wag

10.17.11

hey there!

Well Happy Mothers Day to my wonderful mom. ok yes I know its not really mothers day but over here in the wonderful Argentina it was mothers day yesterday so i thought I would send a little shout out to my wonderful madre! Can I just tell you that I am loving the emails from Mom and dad about their trip. As I was reading about their experience at church it reminded me exactly of me over here in Argentina. yep no one can play the piano so the singing is HORRIBLE. i mean really pretty.....(trying to stay positive) haha and then the whole sacrament meeting is in spanish. Now its not as bad because I understand a lot more. but i just remember my first while here in sacrament meeting I just sat there totally confused the whole time. but like mom said that dad understood the elder that spoke in spanish that was from florida. I am exactly the same way. When a missionary from the united stated speaks spanish I can always understand because of the american accent. haha and No there are not street signs or anything here as far as driving. I would be scared to death to try to drive here because people are insane!! I cant wait to hear about the rest of the Costa Rica adventure! and I am so proud to hear that you guys are getting around fine with the spanish! that makes me super happy!

Well as far as my week.. well we had a baptism on Saturday! yay everything went through super smoothly and Gladis was baptized on saturday. I was super happy. So as missionarys we are told that if someone if getting baptized at the end of the week we have to go visit them everyday that week to prepare them and keep them excited. So we did just that and I am not going to lie every single day that we went I was super nervous that she was going to tell us that she was too scared and couldnt do it. but luckily that did not happen and everyday we went she was excited to see us and excited for her baptism! so we are happy that Gladis was finally baptized! and she seemed super happy after! I have a pic but it wont let me upload on this comp. oh the wonderful computers of argentina. i just love them so much! :)

Pretty much the rest of this past week was not very excited. The week pretty much was just getting Gladis ready and prepared for her baptism. I love having baptisms but the thing that I hate is it means that is one less investigator and not we are on the search for new investigators. She was pretty much the main one we have right now so now we are on the look out for some new gators (investigators) . wish us luck! this area I am realizing is worse than my first area. There is literally a huge church on like every block. The people here are very religious and stuck in their religions.

The weather here continues to get hotter and hotter everyday. Summer is on its way and I am not going to lie I am dreading it more than every. I keep asking people how to survive in summer and they just keep telling me you pretty much dont.. you just suffer. haha awesome! cant wait! they just keep telling me that you are in a constant sweat that doenst ever stop all summer. when you go to bed at night you just need to lay there and not move at all because if you move one part of your body you will start sweating. hahaha oh man! doesnt that sound like a blast! well things are good over here continuing to learn and grow daily and learning to put my trust in God and he will help us. I am realizing more that ever that like it says in the sciptures that God give us struggles and challenges so help us grow and learn. Its true the only way that we are going to grow and learn is if we suffer through the hard times first and that is when we will see the happy times and miracles. I love this gospel more than ever. We truly are blessed to be members and I am grateful for this short time that I have to share this wondefulness with others. Love you all lots. Everyday I realize how grateful and lucky I am to have such an Amazing family.

con amor,
Hermana Van Wagenen

10.17.11

hey there!

Well Happy Mothers Day to my wonderful mom. ok yes I know its not really mothers day but over here in the wonderful Argentina it was mothers day yesterday so i thought I would send a little shout out to my wonderful madre! Can I just tell you that I am loving the emails from Mom and dad about their trip. As I was reading about their experience at church it reminded me exactly of me over here in Argentina. yep no one can play the piano so the singing is HORRIBLE. i mean really pretty.....(trying to stay positive) haha and then the whole sacrament meeting is in spanish. Now its not as bad because I understand a lot more. but i just remember my first while here in sacrament meeting I just sat there totally confused the whole time. but like mom said that dad understood the elder that spoke in spanish that was from florida. I am exactly the same way. When a missionary from the united stated speaks spanish I can always understand because of the american accent. haha and No there are not street signs or anything here as far as driving. I would be scared to death to try to drive here because people are insane!! I cant wait to hear about the rest of the Costa Rica adventure! and I am so proud to hear that you guys are getting around fine with the spanish! that makes me super happy!

Well as far as my week.. well we had a baptism on Saturday! yay everything went through super smoothly and Gladis was baptized on saturday. I was super happy. So as missionarys we are told that if someone if getting baptized at the end of the week we have to go visit them everyday that week to prepare them and keep them excited. So we did just that and I am not going to lie every single day that we went I was super nervous that she was going to tell us that she was too scared and couldnt do it. but luckily that did not happen and everyday we went she was excited to see us and excited for her baptism! so we are happy that Gladis was finally baptized! and she seemed super happy after! I have a pic but it wont let me upload on this comp. oh the wonderful computers of argentina. i just love them so much! :)

Pretty much the rest of this past week was not very excited. The week pretty much was just getting Gladis ready and prepared for her baptism. I love having baptisms but the thing that I hate is it means that is one less investigator and not we are on the search for new investigators. She was pretty much the main one we have right now so now we are on the look out for some new gators (investigators) . wish us luck! this area I am realizing is worse than my first area. There is literally a huge church on like every block. The people here are very religious and stuck in their religions.

The weather here continues to get hotter and hotter everyday. Summer is on its way and I am not going to lie I am dreading it more than every. I keep asking people how to survive in summer and they just keep telling me you pretty much dont.. you just suffer. haha awesome! cant wait! they just keep telling me that you are in a constant sweat that doenst ever stop all summer. when you go to bed at night you just need to lay there and not move at all because if you move one part of your body you will start sweating. hahaha oh man! doesnt that sound like a blast! well things are good over here continuing to learn and grow daily and learning to put my trust in God and he will help us. I am realizing more that ever that like it says in the sciptures that God give us struggles and challenges so help us grow and learn. Its true the only way that we are going to grow and learn is if we suffer through the hard times first and that is when we will see the happy times and miracles. I love this gospel more than ever. We truly are blessed to be members and I am grateful for this short time that I have to share this wondefulness with others. Love you all lots. Everyday I realize how grateful and lucky I am to have such an Amazing family.

con amor,
Hermana Van Wagenen

10.10.11

Hey there my wonderful family and friends!

How is everyone doing? Well yesterday was another holiday in the land of Argentina. I swear that they seriously have holidays like every week and they just make up the most random reasons to have holidays to not have school and work. haha Which meant that yesterday was a day of working for us missionarys and today is our p-day. Well I am happy to say that over here in Obera, Misiones we are preparing a baptism for this saturday. I think I might have mentioned this in my email last week but I will tell you a little more about Gladis. So gladis is the wife of a member but obviously she is not a member. So i am pretty sure that the elders started teaching her in about January. and I have heard that she has constantly had baptism dates but hasnt every really gone through with them. I think in around march she was really excited for baptism and was super close to it and she ended up getting married in march so she could get baptized well something happened and she backed away. So the elders had continued teaching her but not ever knowing what her doubt was or how to help her. So when we got here the elders introduced us to her and basically told us good luck...hope you can figure our her doubt! haha we just laughed and said uhh thanks elders! So we passed by a few days later to see her and it was pretty much the worst lesson ever! The whole time we tried to teach and ask questions she would turn to her husband and she basically wouldnt say a word! I left the lesson super disapointed and with not much hope with her not knowing how to help her. Well we went back the next week and were happy to find that she was home alone and her husband was at work. This was our chance to really get to know her and talk to her and she wont be able to turn to her husband to talk. so we basically did just that. We just talked to and got to know her and her life and left her with a short message. when we went back the next week she was actually excited to see us and asking how we were doing. Well in the second lesson we had with her we talked about baptism and figured out that she basically has this fear that they will have to baptize her like 4 times because she has seen baptisms where that has happened and she doesnt want that to happen with her. Well we put a baptism date with her for the 15 of October but still realizing that she is kind of iffy about it. Well we had passed by several times after that and things we good but everytime we talked about baptism she was still super iffy about it. until one night we went by and she was there alone without her husband and out of now where she asked us who was being baptized on the 15 of October. We just looked at each other and said uhh you!!! then i just sat there scared of what she was about to say when out of now where she said yes actually i think i am going to get baptized on the 15. My comp and i looked at each other in a shock and left her house super happy. well ever since that happened 1 week and a half ago she has still been super excited for her baptism. She basically told us that this is the first time that the missionarys have actually taken the time to talk to her and get to know her because before the elders always just talked to her husband. I am starting to wonder if this is one of the reason for the whitewash here in this area. I mean obviously our president didnt have any idea about this situation but the Lord did and he must of known that gladis was going to progress better with sisters in this area. I dont know but I am super happy and excited!

but other than gladis we dont have too much else to share. We have some other investigators but truly right know we dont have too many that are truly progressing. this is basically always the struggle is finding new people that are really interested and are going to progress. After Gladis I dont really know what is going to happen but I guess you just have to take it one at a time. I am still doing great. Learning and growing more everyday. I am grateful for the struggles that I go through because I know that they are only helping me to grow as a person. Love you all lots! Thanks for all of your love and support. It is greatly appreciated!!!

Love,

Hermana Van Wagenen

Pictures

1. A store named FLOPY! need I say more? ;)

2. The other night as we were walking back to our apt it just starting dumping rain on us and we were pretty much soaked by the time we were in the apt.

3. super cool clouds

4. A day with the primary. ahh man children are crazy!!!!

10.3.11

Hey there!

Wasnt this past weekend so wonderful! Yes over here in the good ole Argentina we were able to watch and listen to conference too! I am lucky because I am in an area where conference was broadcasted in our church building so we were able to watch all of the sessions. Other missionarys who arent in an area where it is broadcasted could only watch one day of conference but I was lucky enough to get to see all of it! and I loved it so much! I absoultely loved the talk that President Uchtdorf gave at the relief society broadcast! That was such an awesome talk. and I was super shocked to hear about the new provo temple that they are going to build. As a missionary the talk by Elder Callister was super awesome about the book of Mormon. Was is just me or did it seem like a lot of conference was really focused on the scriptures and the Book of Mormon. After Elder Scotts talk I basically realized that I need to start memorizing scriptures. But really all of conference was super awesome. I really would like to go back and read all of it right now.

Well this past week was pretty good. On tuesday we had the opportunity to be visited here in Obera by President Hayman and his wife. They came to our district meeting and really taught us how to get people to come to church. because truly the people here are pretty lazy and are hard to get to church. So pres was teaching us how to better get them to come to church. Then after district meeting Hna Hayman came out with us and worked. It was super awesome because she is just great. We were able to have a wonderful lesson with her and then after she took us out to ice cream! they are our mom and dad of the mission. Super sweet!

We had a miracle happen this past week that I cant even express how happy I was. So we have this investigator name Gladis and she is the wife of a member. I am pretty sure the missionarys have been teaching her for forever and the missionarys have put a bunch of baptism dates with her but obviously she has never gone through with them because she has a doubt/ fear about it. Well when we first got here she had a date for baptism but it was more like she didnt really know she had it so we have really tried to take the time to get to know her and figure out her doubt or fear and I dont know if it is because we are sisters but on friday she told us that she is really thinking about baptism and she wants to be baptized the 15 of october. I dont think she has ever straight up told the missionarys like that that she wants to be baptized. So we were pretty much super stoked and excited about that. She said that this is the first time that the missionaries have really taken the time to get to know her because with the elders before they would always talk to her husband and not her. I am starting to think that there must be a reason for the whitewash here in Obera. Pray for Gladis that everything will work for her baptism the 15 of Oct.

Everything is going well here in the mission field. We are continuing to work hard and share the restoration of the gospel here with the people of Obera. Conference was something I really needed to strengthen my testimony and realize really how much these people need these blessings in their lives. The gospel truly is a blessing. I love it so much! I am so grateful I am to be a member of the restored gospel. Love you all lots!! Have a wondeful week!

-Hna Van Wag

9.26.11

hola!!
well I can def say that this week was a better week! I am starting to feel a lot more comfortable in the area and that I am truly able to find my way around and find where people live. It has taken a little bit of time haha but its not easy when we are both brand new in the area and dont know anything. This transfer is def a challenge and one of the most difficult but at the same time probably one of the most incredible because I am truly seeing the help of the Lord in so many ways. I am seeing myself learn and grow so much in this transfer and do things that I never thought I was ready to do at this time. I am not going to lie there is a ton of castellano (spanish) that I dont understand when people talk to me but I just learn to put on a face that I understand and I swear the Lord puts words into my mouth to teach that I didnt know I knew how to teach in spanish. I guess i am learning that I know a lot more that I truly thought I knew and I dont need to know/ understand everything in order to share the gospel with the people. As missionarys we are studying spanish in order to teach the gospel so there is a ton that I dont understand when people arent talking about church things but I am learning that it doesnt affect anything and that I can still be an effective missionary.
It has been such a blessing because there are several returned missionarys in this new area but is awesome because they truly understand us and what it is like to be missionary and we recieved several references from this lady in the branch who has been sharing the gospel with her friends. Oh man I cant even express to you how amazing references from members are. When the members are sharing the gospel like that with their friends it is the best for us as missionarys!! so from awesome references we were able to find some nice new investigators this week. The one thing that we are learning is that I think part of the reason for the whitewash here is that this area just needs a new start. Before the elders left they left us with several investigators but we are basically learning that most of them really arent progressing and we have to let them go and we just really neeed to work hard and find new investigators at this time. so we really dont have much at this time which is hard which means there is going to be a lot of door knocking for us!! oooh yay!! my favorite!! haha not!! thats why references are the best!
Well this past week we found this investigator that the elders were teaching and we were getting to know here and as she was telling me of her life she told us that she was 21 and her husband is like 29. well i didnt think anything too weird about that until she told us that they had been together for 10 years! yes 10 years! that means that they got together when she was umm 11 and he was 19. ahhhh freakin gross!!! I seriously almost died when she told me that. that is like ky with a 19 yr old.. ewww!!!! Argentina can be stinking wierd sometimes! and the other day we visited with a less active family in the branch and their daughter name is Floppy. yes floppy dont you think of a rabbit when you hear that name. hahaha i couldnt help but chuckle when i heard her name. The thing that i am super grateful for at this time is the even though the situation is difficult right now my comp and I are able to laugh about the slammed doors in our faces or the crazy moments. We say hi to all the women by doing the kisses on the cheeks so the other day we were talking to this family outside their house and trying to share with them so we decided to be nice and say bye by kissing them/shaking hands well i went and did the kiss thing with the lady and then went to the man to shake his hand well he tried to go in and kiss and i pulled back and said that we cant kiss the men. he then went off for 5 minutes yelling at me and telling me that i am not christlike because i kissed his wife but not him and that i really dont know God and i need to study more. That christ would treat everyone the same. ahhh! seriously?? haha those are the kind of experiences that we get as missionarys. awesome huh?
But things are good. I am happy and grateful for the experiences that I am having and for the opportunity to I have to devote this time to the Lord and truly serve him. I know this is the true church. that God lives and that I have this opportunity to share this with the people. I am learning that there are a lot of people that dont want to listen or talk to us but as long as I did my part and tried there is nothing more I can do. love you all lots! Thanks for everything! Have a wonderful week!!!

les quiero,
Hna. Van Wagenen

9.19.11

oh heyy!

First of all I just wanted to say thanks for all of the wonderful birthday wishes. They are very much appreciated. :) Well we had our first real week here in Obera, Misiones. It was def better than the first couple of days. We have gotten to know the area a little bit better and the members and we are still working on finding some investigators that the elders were teaching. It has def been an interesting transfers so far but we are moving. very slowly but moving. I never realized how hard it would be to whitewash an area but luckily we have the elders that share the branch and understand a lot more spanish than us and can kind of keep us informed about things. That has for sure been a nice blessing. Well I am just going to tell you a little bit about my new area since the last email was mainly about transfers and all of that craziness. The area I am in is called Obera, Misiones and it is basically this city that I am pretty sure is in the middle of nowhere and there are two sets of missionarys in this area. us and the elders (our district leader) The area that we cover is stinking huge! Like it overwhelms me how huge it us. I am realizing more and more everyday how much the world needs more missionaries because there could for sure be at least 1 or 2 more pairs in this area. Our area is a stinkin mountain. Literally everywhere we walk we are either walking up or downhill. I dont think a flat normal street exists here. Yep it pretty much kills me but Im thinking it might be good for me with all of the delicious food here. The interesting thing about this area that is very different about my other area is that we dont stick out as much!!! There are a LOT of white people here that have like blonde hair and blue eyes. Crazy huh? Today some lady started asking us if we knew where some clinic was but obviously we have no idea because we have only been here for like a week but she asked oh you guys arent from here? ahhh yes!!! someone thought we were from here!! sweet huh! I like that we fit in a little bit better her! There are so many people that I see here that I would totally think they were north american. Another crazy thing about this area is that the dirt here is red. I will have to take a pic to show you. but that is pretty crazy.

As far as missionary work in the area. It has def been interesting. The first couple of days was hard because we were struggling a lot with finding where people lived. Luckily now we have had some help from the members and we have found almost all of our investigators. Teaching has been kind of interesting because we are 2 both fairly new missionaries here so we both lack a lot and the people sometimes have a hard time understanding us but I guess we know more or less enough to get our point accross and tell them to come to church. haha We are basically just starting from scratch with everything so we dont really have anyone that is ready for baptism but there are some people that we are teaching that could be close. we will see. I have been very grateful for some of the members in the area. There are several members who have served missions and know what it is like so they have been a great help so that is def nice! The truth is that I dont have too much to write this week but I can def say that I know that the lord is helping me so much at this time. I am not going to lie when I got the call telling me about transfers I got so scared and felt so incapable of any of this and yes I still feel very incapable but I know without a doubt that the lord is helping me. I am realizing more and more everyday that I know more than I thought I knew. I am realizing that the Lord really does know me and knows the best way for me to grow and learn. and that is by being forced into situations where I cant run away but I just have to do it. Somehow I am surviving in the middle of Argentina where no one speaks spanish and I am teaching the gospel. With my other two companions I could just be silent during a whole lesson and not talk because they would talk the whole time but now I cant do that I have to really take charge and teach the lessons. Christ lives! He loves us and he knows each and everyone of us. This is what we are sharing with the people of Argentina everyday and I know without a doubt it is true. I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have to be serving a mission right know and to devote 1.5 years of my life to the lord. I know that there is no other place I should be right now and I am so grateful for the difficulties and the trials that we go through everyday because I know that it is just helping me to grow and become a stronger person. I appreciate more than every all of your love and support because I know that I wouldnt survive without it. My challenge for you all is to be that member missionary. Share the gospel with everyone. Missionary work truly isnt just for us as missionarys. This past wednesday we had the opporunity to attend a mission conference where Elder Foster from the 70 came and spoke to us. and it was incredible and he talked more than anything about member missionarys and how much more success missionary work will be with the help of the missionarys with the members. love you all! have a wonderful week!!

Love,
Kara

p.s. This computer is actually letting me upload pics so I am taking advantage and putting lots! Enjoy!

pic 1: Last p-day at the bird zoo with the elders.

pic 2: my last day in my other area with Hna Mena and once of the members sons

pic 3: in my last area one day when is rained a ton!

pic 4: you said you wanted pics of my apt. haha this is the bathroom of my last apt. yep its pretty gross

pic 5: a stinkin DISCUTING slug that was in our apt the other day. ewww

pic 6: a bag that says California! ya!!

pic 7: Birthday Cake!!

9.12.11

Hey there!
Wow this day ended up being super crazy! I was suppose to come back to the computer place today at 5 but around 2 today the elders called us up to say that they were going to some bird zoo and asked if we wanted to go. So around 4 we left for the bird place and didnt get back till around 545 and then we had no time to write because we had scheduled to have a FHE with a family tonight so now we are here really quick at night writing because we have to be back in the apt! Well this week has been one of the craziest, most stressfull, shocking, probably hardest weeks of my mission. I am not really sure where to start but I think we will start with last tuesday morning... here we go....
So last tuesday morning we happily went to an investigators house in our nice regular clothes to help her build her house. As we were sitting in her house waiting for her our phone starts ringing and we look at the phone and it said that the assistants were calling. My comp and I both look at each other weird because its not very common for the assistants to call and then she went off in the other room to answer the phone. After a few minutes she comes back to the room to tell me that he called to tell us that they were super proud of our numbers for the week and that we had some of the best numbers in our zone and he also told her that she was going to be training this next transfer and that there is something great in store for me. So I automatically knew that I was leaving the area which I was very grateful for because normally we dont get calls till late tuesday night. So luckily I had all day tuesday to do what I needed to do and say bye to some people. So we got back to our apt at 9 on tuesday night where I started to pack up my stuff for my travels wed and then around 10 I got the real call from my district leader telling me where I was going and everything. He told me that I was heading off to Obera, Misiones with Hermana Green! I dont know if you guys remember but Hermana Green is the Hermana with the red hair that was in my district in the MTC that recieved her visa late. So that automatically meant that I was senior comp. I am not going to lie when I heard that I had a little break down. Never in a million years was I expecting to be senior companion this quick in my mission let alone with a gringo that doesnt speak very much spanish. She only got to argentina about 2 months ago so she doesnt understand/speak very much. So I was already in stress mode when I heard that because I dont feel capable of being senior comp and with my small spanish. ahhh! Well that wasnt the end of my news about transfers. My district leader then told me that Hermana Green and I would be heading off to a totally new area that is being white washed. I dont know if you know what white washed means. Well basically means that there were elders in this area but for some reason the president decided to take out the elders and put Hermanas here. So we were coming to an area that neither of us knew and we basically have to learn the area/ members/ investigators totally on our own. Yes this has been the most insane/ shocking week of my mission.
So early wednesday morning Hermana Green and I got on a bus together and headed on a 6 hour trip to Misiones. When we got her our district leader and his comp were here waiting and took us to our new apt where the elders that were previously in this area were waiting. We then spent a little bit of wednesday night and all day thursday with the elders that were previously in this area and they showed us around the area and introduced us to a few members and investigators and then they said bye and left us on our own in this new area. I cant even explain to you how stressful it is to whitewash an area especially when I dont know the language very well. I can def say that I think the lord has blessed me with a talent of figuring out directions because somehow we havent gotten too lost in finding peoples houses. but it is basically like they sent to fresh gringos in the middle of now where with very little information and said good luck. haha! yes like i said i am in a shock! I think the pres has some image that I know a lot more than I do. but I know for sure that this is going to be a very difficult/ faith trying transfer. I am really going to have to put my trust in the lord that even though my spanish is not very good that he will help me to teach these people and help these people know of the truth. I dont in anyway feel capable for this responsibility that has been put on me this soon in my mission but I am having trust that the lord knows that I can do it. I have been very grateful these past few days for my last companion Hermana Mena and all of the things that she taught me because she would get mad at me a lot for not talking during lessons and make me talk more and at the time I would get so frustrated but now I am so grateful because I know that she was just helping to prepare me for this next adventure in my mission. I am super sad because I missed the baptism of Francisco but I know there is a reason I am here at this time I am just not really sure yet what that reason is. haha
My new area is absolutely beautiful. Super different from my first area. There are millions of trees here and way nice houses compared to my first area and we are in kind of a bigger city. but I just might die here because literally the whole city is hills. Everywhere we walk we are either walking up or down hills. I am dying!!!!! I didnt know I was coming on my mission to go on a 9 hr hike everyday but I guess soo... ahhh. oh and we have already encountered more bugs than I have ever seen in my mission. We found two discusting cockroaches in our apt and out a now where this big discusting slug. ahhh!!! I dont know if it has something to do with elders living there?? haha I have a ton more things that I can write but seriously no time. I guess they will just have to wait for next week. until then the church is true! Jesus Christ lives! and the book of mormon is true! I dont know how I would survive without the BOM it helps me through so much on my mission! love you all!!!

con amor,
kara

p.s. any one have any good advice for being a senior comp? ahhh I dont even know.
p.s.s thanks for your prayers they are def appreciated/felt/ and needed at this time. love you lots!!


Picture: that pic is of Hermana Mena, Francisco and I before I left the area!