¡¡¡Feliz Primavera!!!

[Will's first baptism]

Hello All,

Happy Spring! The first day of Spring was wonderful. The 21st of September. Except for you all it’s the first day of Fall. I’m sorry, but I’ll take Spring. It’s a much more pleasant season for me. But a hot Christmas is still going to be weird, I think.

I had a baptism on Saturday. His name is Ramiro Fierro. It was the first time I baptised someone in my life. I was very nervous, but when the time came I just said what I needed to and it went without a hitch.

I feel I should talk a bit about ice cream. There are all sorts of ice cream places here in Villa Mercedes. Apparently San Luis is famous for the ice cream. I haven’t had any yet. I’m begining to doubt if I ever will. Every day we wait for the bus across the street from an ice cream shop that looks very good. We have been offered ice cream from there before, but rejected the temptation because we were late. But then this week we met our goals for the day and would’ve had enough time to get ice cream and get home on time. So we stopped by the ice cream shop. It was closed. Clearly I am not meant to have good ice cream on my mission.

I apologize for the shortness of entry this week. I really just can’t think of what to say.

Oh yeah! I almost forgot the Argentina culture fact thing. People put dogs on their roofs. When they leave the house they put the dog on the roof so that it can walk around, but won’t wander off. So, there are dogs on the roofs all over the place.

Well, until next week,
Elder Budge

Pictures: Setting up for Church... before and after.

More email newsy stuffs

Hello All;

Well, another week here in Villa Mercedes(Viya Mercedes(like the car)). It's starting to get pretty hot here. Spring officially rolls in on Sunday, so all the trees are starting to get leaves and it's increasingly beautiful. Of course with newly living trees comes the realization that I'm very allergic to one of the most common trees here in Argentina. I'm not sure what it's called, but it has this white/grey camouflage-looking bark and it has these weird ball things from the branches; and I sneeze like none other every time I am under one.

Other than that things go well. Lunches at members' houses are delicious, albeit a little bland. But that's food in Argentina. They have this food called Milanesa. It's basically thin bits of beef fried like chicken. Similar to chicken-fried steak, a food that I was introduced to at the MTC, but better.

They have these really good kind of cookie here called Alfajor(pronounced alfahore). They're basically a sandwich cookie with two or three cookies, and in between the cookies is some sort of thing, usually dulce de leche. And the whole thing is coated in chocolate. I have had some really rich ones.

Other things... Hmmm... Ramiro is getting baptized this week. This is very exciting for everyone involved. Yay!

Well, until next week,
Elder Budge

Meh, I'll let you guys come up with a title for this one, I can't think that hard right now.

Hello again!

This week was my first Zone Conference. As such, I got my first batch of mail. I would like to thank those of you who sent me letters. I haven’t really gotten a chance to read them yet since I can’t read them until P-day and up until right now I’ve been cleaning. As for the rest of you, just so you know, I get mail every six weeks at Zone conference. It’s very fun and exciting to get mail. Especially since I can only get it every six weeks. Also, I will try my hardest to write everyone back. As I can only write back on P-day, I will always try to get something back to you so that you can, if you wish, write back before the next Zone Conference. Anyway, enough about that; more about Zone Conference.

Zone Conference was really cool. We left Villa Mercedes at 7 PM to get to San Luis at about 8:30 PM. Then we slept there. For about four hours. We got up at 2 AM so that we could get on our bus to Mendoza at 3. We got to Mendoza at about 6:30, a surprisingly short trip. I suspect the bus driver was going way too fast. But I somehow managed to sleep on most of it, so it was all good.

The featured speaker at the Conference was Elder Aidukaitis, a new member of the First Quorum of the Seventy and Second Councilor of the South America South Area Presidency. He had a lot to say. He made it seem like we will soon start working during the Siesta, but President Lindahl hasn’t said anything about that yet.

Elder Neibaur was diagnosed with strep on Tuesday. He’s doing much better now, though.

We were stopped on the street this last week by a kid who told us that he has problems with all sorts of drugs and wants to change. We invited him to Church and gave him a book of Mormon with a chapter marked for him. He said that he’d come. He didn’t. Oh well, we can only hope that he’ll show up one of these weeks, we foolishly didn’t get his address.

On Tuesday we’re holding a special Family Home Evening for our investigators/new converts/less-active members. It’s going to be one of those play out the Plan of Salvation type things. I know that the Mt. Vernon Stake had one of those last year. We’re very excited for it.

And now, some Argentina Fun Facts. Okay, really just one, but it’s a good one.

This fact goes out to all those Utahns and people who just love that perfect blend of ketchup and mayonnaise: Fry Sauce.

I bet you all thought that it was an invention of Utah. You’d maybe be wrong. I only got this information off of the back of a bag of Helman’s Salsa Golf. Fry sauce exists in Argentina too. Only here it’s called Salsa Golf, or golf sauce. Anyway, according to the back of the package, some Argentine invented it as he was sitting around at the golf club in 1973 or something like that. I really have no idea who really made it, or what the circumstances were. But fry sauce, or salsa golf, is everywhere in Argentina.

So, until next time,
Elder Budge

Another Week, Another E-mail

Well, now I've had another week to acclimatize myself to Villa Mercedes. As of last night we have officially ventured to every part of our Area. At least I think so. I'm not positive, but it's close. Still not used to these Spanish keyboards.

The Spanish that people speak here is kinda different from what I grew up hearing. That probably has to do with the fact that I grew up hearing Mexican Spanish from the teachers and El Salvadorian Spanish from the kids. This is Argentine Spanish, or Castellano as they call it. It's slightly different. The "ll" and "y" make a "sh" or "jh" sound. It's hard to describe in writing. They also use quite a few Italian words. The ones that I have noticed the most are "ciao" and "basta."

The people here are really great. In my ward, Hipolito Yrigoyen, there are some new members, a father and a son named Moyano. They are really cool and both love music. Jorge, the father, plays the accordion extremely well. So well that it´s to the point where I want to learn how to play the accordion. Marco, the son (age:24), plays guitar, bass guitar, and some piano. Dad, I think that you would really like them. They're both very strong in the church, and know more about some of the deeper, cooler stuff of the Gospel than many who have been in the Church for their whole lives. Every time we go over to their house they always keep us there a little longer than we should be because we always end up singing hymns with them and they always ask for one more. Mostly we go over to their house to talk with Marco's friend Bruno. Except that we've only seen him there once...

We have two other investigators with baptism dates. Both related (genetically and not) to another new member named Gabriela. First is Alexis. He is Gabriela's 13-year-old nephew. He was actually supposed to get baptized this coming up weekend. Then he was sick and missed a week of Church. Then he missed this week too. It's sad. I hope he keeps coming and gets baptized.

The other is Ramiro. He's Gabriela's on-again-off-again boyfriend. But he came to Church this week and really likes it. He's very smart. I'm not used to having someone pay so much attention to me when I'm talking. Granted, I'm still not talking all that much. It would seem that the new language has brought about a return of shyness that I have overcome in English.

My companion is Elder Neibaur. He's from somewhere in Idaho. Near Boise, I think. He's pretty cool. He sure knows what he's doing. I don't know if there's ever been a companionship with both names that are very hard for the locals to pronounce like ours are. Yesterday we were talking with a couple older men, and one of them stopped a couple of girls who were walking down the street just to see if they could read our names.

Well, there are lots of dogs here. They're everywhere. Some are pets, most are not. They just hang around. Follow you sometimes.

Please send me mail. I get my first batch of mail on Wednesday, we have a conference with Elder Aidukaitis and then we have Zone Conference. I would love to get mail then. Remember, you can send mail through USPS, through Pouch, or through Dear Elder.com.

Oh! Yesterday, being the fifth Sunday, there was a combined Priesthood/Relief Society. They gave us a tour of www.new.familysearch.org, but the Spanish page. It looks really cool. I can hardly wait two years before I can play with it myself.

Well, I have attached a video giving a wonderful tour of where I live. [The clip he attached actually was two seconds of MTC footage. I don't know what happened to the attachment he intended to include - JRB]

So, until next week,
Elder Budge

I Survived!!!

Well, I seem to have survived the trip. The biggest adventure right now is probably typing this. 1) This keyboard is weird. 2) I need to get used to typing on a Spanish keyboard. Anywhoo, as I continue to be serenaded by the 80's hits in this gas station I will write my message.

First off, some... ugh, I've only been out of the country for a week and I'm already forgetting words... Logistics! That's the word. Firstly, email is for family only, so anyone else will have to send letters by snail mail or dear elder. Sorry. Secondly, packages. Anyone is free to send packages but they should only come around Christmas and my birthday (Apr. 24).

Okay, now for the trip. Pretty much, I didn't sleep for two days. But the traveling went off without a hitch. Except one Hermana (our travel leader) didn't show up. We had no idea what was going on since that was very uncharacteristic for her. When we got to Buenos Aires we found the other Hermanas from our MTC district and they said that her birthday on her passport was wrong.

We got the chance to go through the Buenos Aires Temple as we waited for our flight to Mendoza. It was pretty scary in Spanish.

So, then we got to Mendoza and got our assignments. I'm working in the province of San Luis in a very nice little town called Villa Mercedes. It's very nice here and everyone is very friendly, especially the Members.

Nothing too scary. Except that as we were walking by a meat store called Quickfood to meet some recent converts there was an experience. We saw a man walk out with two boxes, presumably full with money, point a revolver at the security guard then at my companion and myself before he shoved it in his pants and rode off on a motorcycle. That was scary, but unusual.

Other than that, I can't think of a much safer place than here.

On Saturday there was a special Priesthood conference. It was a Q&A with Elder Scott for the Saints in Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay. It was really cool. One brother asked if people with mental illnesses needed to be baptized. Elder Scott's answer was quick and short. "No. They are covered by Christ's Atonement."

Not much else going on. We have a baptism in a couple weeks.

Sorry for the continuation of no pictures. Next week, I promise.

Until then,

Elder Budge

6... 5... 4... 3... 2...

Well, things continue to move along. We met with the Consul today. He was a very nice and funny man. He seemed somewhat annoyed at having to coach our pronunciation, but we got through that part quickly. I had thought that I would be pronouncing "yo me llamo" as "jo me jamo", but I was wrong just the regular old "yo me yamo." El Señor Consul tought us how to make the "ñ" on the keyboard. It's "Alt 164."

He got extremely passionate when he started talking about the food. He told us to just have steaks and things all the time because you can get amazing beef for as much as a hamburger at McDonalds. And he condemned us if we put ketchup on our meat or bleu cheese or thousand island dressing on our salads.

When we asked him to tell us about Mendoza he said, "Now, you're the lucky ones." That made all of us going to Mendoza very excited. The most common phrase among us since then has been "I'm so stoked for Argentina!!!"

Now comes the part of the week where I keep thinking "I'll do better next week", but just keep doing the exact same thing. Maybe it will chage when I get to Argentina, maybe not. But I know there was something I wanted to talk about, but have now forgotten. Hm... Don't really know. Maybe I'll think of it.

So, it's my last week here at the MTC. ... Oh yeah! I got my FLIGHT PLANS on Friday! So, the three Hermanas in my district who are giong to Buenos Aires fly from SLC to DFW and then to Buenos Aires. The rest of us are going to Mendoza. For the most part we are going from SLC to LAX to Santiago, Chile to Buenos Aires. But there is one Elder in my district who parts ways with us in LA. He gets to go through Lima, Peru. And he gets to Buenos Aires a good two hours before the rest of us. Oh well, that's life. Um... I would give everybody my flight numbers, but I can't remember them right off the top of my head. I mailed them home, so maybe someone can post the flight info for anyone who's interested once they get there.

We had the Health and Safety lecture. When they started talking about scavies my district all just looked at each other.

Not too much else exciting other than that in one week from now I'll be in Argentina.

Only two more times of service. I really need to take before and after pictures so that you can all see the wonder that we work turning the gym into a mini-conference center.

So, I don't know when I'll be able to write next because I don't know where I'll be or when my p-day will be.

Well, my creative well has run dry. Well, probably not, but my nose has started bleeding again. That's one thing I don't understand. My nose has just randomly been bleeding here. I have no idea why. It can't be the altidtude since I lived just down the street for the last eight months. Unless a few feet make that big of a difference. Maybe it's the food. I really don't know.

Speaking of food (because I don't think I mentioned it last time because I think it happened since), The MTC food is sometimes really gross, sometimes really good. But the other day I had a really gross experience. I looked in my beans and I found a nut. Yes, a nut. And not the edible kind. It was made of steel. And there was a pea inside. I found that quite amusing. I don't really know where it came from, but I decided that I had better have cereal for that dinner.

For those who wish to continue writing me here are some options:

1) DearElder.com-- I hear that this works in the mission field. I belive it costs something, same as US postage, I think. I have heard that the mission president prints them off weekly.

2) Pouch Mail-- I believe that my pouch address is on the site here. At least it should be. This is probably the most reliable way for me to get a hand-written letter. You send a one-sheet of paper letter, folded in three and taped closed with the addresses on it, to Salt Lake through the USPS. From there somebody brings it down with them to Argentina. I get it at a mission conference or Zone conference. Apparently it comes every six weeks or so.

3) USPS international mail-- This is more expensive and not so reliable. The Argentine mail is rather corrupt. They open mail, so if you send it this way, cover it with Catholic stickers, they'll respect it. Also, I heard from a Chilean teacher here whose brother served in Mendoza that the mail workers went on strike and burned all the mail, so beware.

4) E-mail-- This is definitely going to be the most reliable way to get to me. I will be able to check my email once a week, and respond then too. My mission email is: william.d.budge.AMM@myldsmail.net I do not know if I will be able to use any other email, that is up to my mission president. If I can, I'll let you all know.

Well, I have now, for the first time, effectively used my email time to the point where the countdown timer clock is blinking at me. Godspeed to all of you.

Next time in Argentina,

Elder Budge



Post Script: Will's travel schedule --

Delta 1735 to LAX Departs 9:35 a.m. Arrives 10:44 a.m. Aug. 18, 2008

LanChile 601 to Santiago, Chile Departs 1:20 p.m. Arrives 5:25 a.m. Aug. 19, 2008

LanChile 1447 to Buenos Aires Departs 6:25 a.m. Arrives 9:25 a.m. Aug. 19, 2008

T-13 Days and Counting...

Well, here it is, thirteen days until I head for Argentina. Yup. Not too much happened this week, so I will share some highlights/insights/commentary about other, more general things. Maybe.

Apparently there has been an outbreak of Yellow Fever in Argentina. Good thing that I could be bothered to go to the travel clinic that Kaiser told me about to get one. Yup. Fortunately it's in the north and northeast of the country, so I should be fine.

In the past few weeks they moved a lot of couches into the building where my classroom is. This was a welcome development because, quite frankly, couches are comfortable. Upon closer inspection the couches seem to be the very same couches that have been the apartments at BYU's Heritage Halls. I think I may have found my old couch, but maybe not. This must mean that Heritage has new couches. Huzzah for all living there this fall.

In other news, the time here is beginning to get to those in my district. Normally the Elders start doing wild and crazy things as a result of cabin fever. But no, it was the Hermanas. Yesterday at dinner two of the Hermanas decided to have a chugging contest. They downed the first glasses of water, but spilled all over themselves during the second round.

Today was, very likely, the last time I will go to the Temple for two years. Next week I will be meeting with the Argintine Console, and the week after that I'll be in Mendoza. Hopefully I'll be able to go before I come back to the States. If I do my job right (and they build with a mad fury) we will have a Temple in Mendoza. Or I can hope that they finish the bullet-train from Mendoza to Buenos Aires quickly and that my mission president will let us take it to go to the Temple. I would say that one is less likely to happen, but who knows. Ojala que si.

I must say, I am rather impressed with myself. I have come to this entry today with less planned out than usual, and yet I have managed to write more than usual in less time. Amazing how those things work.

I have seen several people I know so far. Most recently Billy Nixon and Paul Cunha. Neil Steinburg comes in tomorrow. We're all going to try to take the cliche pointing at the map picture this Sunday. Given that we all somehow get the word to each other in time. And, bonus in the picture, Tommy Crompton and maybe one other Elder from Northern Virginia will join us.

Speaking of Northern Virginia, there is a teacher in my zone by the name of Hermano (I don't know his first name) Caramello who is from Burke. It's always nice to see people from back home. He's really funny.

Um... Not much else going on. Really gotta go so that I can get my suit to the dry cleaners and Elder Roy can get some dryer sheets. So, until next week and the six-day mark, farewell.

Elder Budge