Elder Ross email - 23 Jan 2008

(Spencer and Ross met in Buenos Aires, Spencer was leaving and Ross was arriving. It was nice that they were able to see each other at the temple)

Hey Famila
I Made it to Argentina. The Flight to Buenos aries was way long. Once we got to buenos aries I got to go to the temple. Spencer was in my endowment sesion. it was way cool to see him. Oh before the temple we had to check in our bags and I left my razor in the bags so I havent shaven for three days. After the temple we went to the another airport.
This little lady just started riping in to me in english. I just let here blow off some steam and walk away. Then I had another Flight it was shorter though. Then presdent and Sister Olsen met us at the airport and took us to the instute building with some of the office elders.
They feed us and then booked us into a nice hotel.
In the moring we had breakfast at the hotel and  then went back to the instute building. Met my new companero Elder Toone. Way cool he was born in lethbridge but lived in utah American Fork. Es Kupo.
We did this cool contact activity it was way neat. We took to this gypisy family for like half an hour I understand about half of what they are saying. My comp is really good at telling them that it is my first day in argentina.
Ya how are things doing at your end of the world?
Hope work/school is going well for everyone?
No photos at this time because I have not ug out my cord yet.
Oh right i am serving two hours away From  cordoba in two towns called...
I can´t remeber but I promise to find out by monday. It is like the biggest area in the mission so lots of walking Hora!
okay Cordoba is structuraly kind of like if you took the vatican. Took out all the preist and put spanish people there and let them build up for a few centurays. Which is kind of what happned.

Oh its like really hot outside. So Iam drinking lots of water and should probally be drinking more. Oh Ihave $ 370 peso a month for living so that 94.25 a WEEK so i should be good on the living end.
Mas Importante
My P-days are on MONDAY so write me on sunday nights I guess.
Love ya all;
Elder Blaszczyk

PS Zach
¿Como va buscar por Grad Cita? How goes the rugby training? Do not kill anything with your airsoft gun okay.

PS Justine
Okay I finaly got your letter from christmas. Okay your friend needs to take the disscuions to make sher that it is something he wants to do. But good for him and his excitment keep me posted. Share with him the story of Enos and your personal testimony of Prayer. If he has any doubts.
Okay have you finished the whole twilight seirs or just twilight. Because the other books are just as good if not better.

Ps Madison,
How goes it in your part of the world? It pretty cool here you would like it. How goes being the Secrtary. I hope you are having fun with it.

Ps Mom and Dad,
I Am okay and I love you lots. Wo write you guys is makeing me home sick new experince. Okay under control. Ya loving it here in my sun little place of paridse. Alright don´t worry it going to be okay.  Get everyone to send me an email okay indvidualy probally is best I now have an hour for email.

Elder Ross - 28 Jan 2008

(District photo)

I was just writing a letter and hit the wrong key and lost it so here I go again. The keyboards here are realy cramped.
Hola,
Okay it is really hot here.
Ya I live in a city called Villa maria, but in our area is also villa nueva.
My comp is pretty cool. We try to follow all the rules. Hes also a district leader so we have lots of work to do.
The work goes well here. We are teching this lady whose name is ceilo, her whole family is baptized except her so that will be good. We are also teaching her two friends. we are also teaching a girl named Belin who is 14. She is keeping the commitment and is really excited about the church. We have a couple of other investigators but I have not met them yet.
Ya my president is so k-po. Argentina slang word for awsome. This wife is also pretty cool. Jordan is not inmy district, but he was training this transfer and that when he saw my comp and I. Good knews church is the same every where you go. They still argue about talking to inactives for anything. but ya the members are our real strenght here.
We got a email  about presdenit Hinckjleys death. That was way sad to hear.
Okay I have found out the three most important words in argentina are
Facturias-rolls stuffed with jelly or dulce de leche
Empanades- like paroges but like a million times better because they are stuffed with meat
Alfhoras - like a wagon wheel but with two cookies covered with chocolate
I have still not found my cord for the camera but have not had much time.
Well love you all,
Ross

Ps. Zach
okay one dayin my life.
7:oo am wake
work out for 30 mintutes
eat breakfast and prepare
personal study for an hour with 30 min for pmg.
Companiship which we discuss what we are going to teach. for an hour.
10:30 start working street contacting or appointment deppends what we have planed.
12:30 have lunch with members. members like to feed us so we are always full afterward. Oh in argentina the big meal is lunch because everyone wakes up late and gose to bed really late.
1:30 back to the appartment for 30min.-hour of lang. in the area I serve in the people here have a seista from 12-4:30 so no one is out and do not like to be distubred so we study some more or have appontmeints already set up. In thw evening is when we have most of our apponetimts so we get back around 10 pmthen plan and unwind.
So ya that what my day is usally like. 

Elder Ross - 5 Feb 2008

OK, so redemption is possible.... (picture is of his zone... I think)

Funny story about the jury thing Ross mentions. The day Ross flies out of the MTC we get a summons for him to appear before a jury selection board. We of course sorted it all out.

9o here the letter but no photos i figure this out eventually
Feb 5 2008
Okay I got special permision to write home because of that little misshape yesterday.

So I got the photo that is so cool.
I am doing well it is really hot right now so I am sweeting lots. I have lost 6 pounds already so that’s good.
Okay about the baptism on Saturday I had. It was for this lady whose name is Celia. She is married to a member and all her kids are members so that is good. Um their gypies so there house is pretty intresting. It is a broken down bus but they are good people and fine addition to our branch. So here are some photos of that.
 We are also teaching the husbands Nices and her husbands.
They are really ready we just have to get them married. But we are working on that and they want to so that good.
I had Two asuedas this week which was really good. Lots of meat. They are the argentian BBQ. So lots of good beef.

I had my first interview with President Olsen. Decied I should work on paicnce this transfer. I got to know lots of missionarys in the zone so that was good. There is one who has lost 70 pounds and has not been out a year so High hopes for me and my goal.
Um language is going pretty well. I keep improving each day and speaking more yesterday I tried to do a door approach and got stuck it was pretty fun now that I think about it. But ya that is going okay.
It was weird to think that I am not going to see president Hinckley at general confreness anymore. He has always been such a constent.
Oh we had 10 people at church on Sunday so that was good. And we have 14 new investigatoirs we got to go contact this week. We had the Aisstiants help last week because we went on splits with them Friday and Thursday.
Oh I found my cord it was in my suit poceket the whole time.
Love ya
Elder blaszczyk

PS Zach,
Whats up crazy man? Calc was definetly one of the hardest subjects for me that last semesiter so good luck. Man your going to elders quorm I feel so old now. Hows being the teacher? How is trying to find a date for grad going? You to get on that.
But love ya man.

PS Madison,
How goes life? I am always on the go down here so many people are resptive to the gospel here it is amazing. Well love ya

PS Justine,
How goes the reading? Are there any cool movies coming out soon?

PS Mom and Dad,
Thank you for the emails. It’s nice to here from home every week. Oh can you please keep a copy of these document As I send them on the silver computer for me in my documents. That so cool to hear about your art classes mom. I have been feeling the urge to draw on p-days my self. Dad thanks for the thing about the Jury. Uoo one thing about the day to day here is they are crazy drivers. It is always an intresting experience to ride in a taxi. But it is vary safe.So it picture time

Elder Ross - 4 Feb 2008

OK it seems that I am not the only one who sometimes has difficulty with technology.  (The picture is of Celia)

Oh I hate his cleint.
Sorry I just lost my letter again. because i tried to add some pictures and closed the wrong window.
So otherwise I am doing good. I had my first baptism which was good. Her name was celia.
We had 10 people at church on sunday which was good. I also had an asueda which was really good. its an agrentinaina asueda lots of meat.
The members are really good here with helping us find people.Man I hate this system of writing letters next week I will try something difrent way. I am doing good
love

Elder Ross - 11 Feb 2008

OK Another one in the wrong order. (This is a picture of Belen)

Dear family, and all others who may read this letter,

I am doing well, Lots of walking so that’s good.
Okay about sending letters and packages to me. Send them to the mission home address. That is the easiest and safest way for me to revice anything. Also on packages send them through national mail and mark the value as little as possible and keep them small. Or else I will have to pay tax and may not recive the package if sent through a difrient courier.
Ya this week was pretty long. Elder Robens of the seventy came and visited us. So we had a special conference for zone conference. It was pretty neat. He talked about the mission in general for experiences we are having. Also let us ask questions about being more effective missionarys which was cool. On Sunday there wasa special meeting for members in my district so that was good. It was all in Spanish though so a little difficult to understand.
About last week we had 10 investigatores at church. So that was good we only had 4 this week because of the conference.
The Spanish is coming along. Everyone says my Spanish is improving every day so that’s good.
I am in 2 Nephi 2 in my scripture reading in Spanish and am understanding most of it.
Okay one story.
                  We are teaching this Girl her name is Belen. We try to have her aunt who she lives with        in the lessons. But she has been really negative towards us in past visits. So we decied to share the Family a proclamation to the world with her. As we talked about the family with her and her goals for her family she really warmed up to us and our message. So it was cool to see the spirit touch her and start to change her wants for her family.

Ya love you all,
Elder Ross Blaszczyk,

Elder Ross e-mail - 18 Feb 2008

Sorry this is in  reverse order, I'

ll try to catch up and then they will be posted properly. 

Good morning Canada,                                                                            Feb 18 2008

In answer to moms email about sending stuff send it to the mission home.
Well this week was really hot in argentina for like four days it was above 35 degrees during the afternoon.
My companion is doing well, he has a sore throat right now but all is well.  It is so cool to see pictures of you guys and now that you are all alright. But ya those hats are cute/ funny looking.
This week was really busy. We have four investigators we had to get ready for their baptismal interview this week so lots of running around. But they are all doing well. Belen’s aunt came to church this Sunday which is awesome. Better, she said she had liked.
Oh so cool of an experience this week. So we, Elder Toone and I, are over at a recent converts house, her name is Maria, and talking to her Daughter, whose name is Veronica, she is 23. She has sort of showen intrest in the church but has not really wanted to commit. But, Elder tone and them are just talking, I still do not understand a whole lot when people talk about other things than the gospel even then I’m not a 100 percent sure. So we are just talking about her job and life. Then she turns to me and realizes that I do not understand anything they are saying. And she mentioned that she wants to learn English. She asked if we could teach her. We were like sure. But you have to listen to our message after. She was like actually I want to hear your message and she just totally opened up to us and we talked about repentace with her. It was so freaking cool. To see the spirit work with her.
Spanish is coming along as it does, Some days I understand a lot others not so much. But ya everyone says I keep improving.
Okay one thing a church that was funny was there was a bird in the chapel. Our chapel did not have power for like the first two hours of church so they had the windows open, and I guess this bird flew in.

Ya so I love you all, Be safe,
Elder Ross Blaszczyk

Elder Ross Letter - 25 Feb 2008

Ross suggested that we post his e-mails on the blog so anyone who's interested can read them, so here's this week's letter

Dear family, loved ones etc.                                                               Feb, 25 2008
 Holy cow this week just about blew my socks off int he busy scale.
So by the photo that you hopefully finally recived, you can tell that our four investigators got baptized. It was so amsome the spirit was really strong, and we had a lot of the memebers out as well. So it was really good. Also the president of the branch´s daughter was geting baptized so they had a party after for all our baptiazes because she turned 8 this week.
Ya this is the last full week of my first transfer so that is crazy! Me and my comp are working really hard. And, yes my comp is related to the whitehead family.
So most of this week was just making sure our investigators were ready for baptism so lots of running around since our mission leader was away this week.
last night my comp and I went and heard elder Holland speak to the youth of Argentina over the satilaite. He is such a good speaker he really empahized the fact that. The youth now are the leaders tommotow which was good.
Ya not a whole lot to say abot this week,
Oh I am now 146 Kgs so I am losing wait still that is good. i might be because we did not have power in our pension for 4 days this week. We do not have power because Elder toone did not know how to pay the bill so they cut our power.
But ya,
Love you all,

One Year Later

So how's this for an entry, one year intervals. Renovations continue and since we don't seem to be finishing the reno's we decided to go to Banff for Family day. Luckily we found a great store with some funny hats. We thought the picture was pretty funny. 

Reno Continues

Heres a picture of the construction zone, safely taken from behind a plastic vapor barrier. Zach's cleaning up some of the remains chipped away from the ceiling. If you hadn't been part of the crew doing the job, it would have seem like no progress had been made. We mostly just did small meticulous jobs like sanding the edges of drywall, cleaning the roof up, and mudding the walls. But dad says a lot of progress has been made, even though it doesn't look like it.
At 5:24 we're finally done for the day. We''d continue except we've run out of mud, and we need that before we can drywall. So we'll leave some work to do another day, and another mess to clean up.

Family Day

Well today is Family Day in Alberta. Today we are working on the house. We had a family home evening lesson on the finer art of drywalling, mudding and taping and put our new found skills to the test. Including sanding as seen by the picture. We look like old age bandits in our get up.