Adventures in La Punta

Good morning,

Another week has passed by and another email proceeds forth to the ends of the earth from the rented cyber desk of Dallin Backstrom.

This week I did a companion exchange with La Punta, and went there to work with Elder Nelson. His companion came to the city and stayed there with El. Enriquez. La Punta is a small suburban development about 7 kilometers north of the city. the density is very low and so there is consequently a large amount of walking involved to get between the places where people actually live. We worked all afternoon in a small corner of the area. We had the opportunity to meet several people, one of whom was a trucker named William (in Spanish Guillermo) who was in town and outside washing his car. We talked to him and apparently he had spoken to missionaries before but they had only come by one time, so we were able to employ the principle "teach while you find" and explain a lot of things to him, as well as give him a Book of Mormon, which he said he was really interested in reading to be able to know what significance it had to his life- all while he washed his 80' BMW.

I also found several books from the series of manuals Teachings of the Presidents of the Church in my pension, and started to read by topic on Sunday (while my companion was in bed with a headache)

from the Joseph Smith tome. I was impressed by the relevance of the discourses and the frank, logical power by which they where delivered. I was reminded of the important, divine commission of Joseph Smith as the first Prophet of God in this dispensation and the fidelity with which he carried out his mission to not only restore but to preach and teach the correct principles of the restored Gospel. I read a chapter about peacemaking that reminded me that at times we teach far more powerfully with our actions than with our words.

Pictures attached, Have a good week,

Elder Backstrom

El. Backstrom looking cool at a bus stop maybe?

"4 Hugs a day, that's the minimum..."

It is difficult to identify the 4th person in this selfie

Cool stone structure!

Argentine landscapes

Dallin with some graffiti

We Talk of Christ, We rejoice in Christ, We prophesy of Christ...

Wow I do not have tons of time to write this week!

So I'll just tell a quick story from my week and then send some pictures. This week we had a lot of rain and not a lot of open doors. We actually got to Thursday without having been able to teach a single lesson. However we had planned a game night with a member family and even though it was raining we were still able to go. We got there and one of the young women from the family had invited a friend from school to the activity. We were able to play some games, eat some ice cream and then share a brief but powerful scripture that summarizes in one our faith in Christ:

2 nefi 25:26- Y hablamos de Cristo, nos regocijamos en Cristo, predicamos de Cristo, profetizamos de Cristo y escribimos según nuestras profecías, para que nuestros hijos sepan a qué fuente han de acudir para la remisión de sus pecados.

(Here it is in English for all us non Spanish Speakers: 2 Nephi 25:26  And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins.)

Whoops, that's in Spanish. oh well. The experience was a very positive one and the young lady accepted the invitation to learn more about the gospel. Working in close coordination with the members of the church is essential to help people experience the gospel in a non-confrontational way- and always results in a higher degree of curiosity and openness in the people who are being prepared to receive the gospel in their lives.

Have a good week, I included some photos.

El. Backstrom

Argentine Car, not sure why he included this.

Dallin got a new soccer outfit. His dad says he looks bigger, what do you think?

Serious Selfie

Dallin's favorite little dog

Another note from an e-mail Dallin sent me:

I am now officially a fan of "Racing Club", a professional Argentine football team that was champion of the Argentina league this year. They are probably the third biggest club in the nation; the classic two are River Plate Athletic Club and Club Atletico Boca Juniors- sort of like the maple leafs and the Montreal Canadians- but racing is pretty important too and I like it for a variety of reasons. anyways hopefully they'll win the south america cup (called "libertadores" sort of like champions league in Europe) and then go on to the world cup of clubs. The Racing club was the first champion of the world cup of clubs. ever. ever. yeah. anyways, that's that. have a good week,

El. Backstrom

By the way how is FC Edmonton doing, do they even still exist? I hope so...

Hockey. You just can't explain it!

Well, what a week we've had! It's not been the most productive one, to be entirely honest- we went out with members accompanying us three whole afternoons, and there was no one who was available... Well, those are the things that happen sometimes. Ha. I just thought of a joke, but it wouldn't be funny for anyone but me. (Para de sufrir!) (Because there's this Brazilian church called the universal church and they go around placing their hands on people's foreheads and saying STOP SUFFERING! and it's very funny. so many Argentinians make this joke when someone has a problem, they just say Para de sufrir! and everyone laughs. but you had to be there.) Still, it was a very interesting week and we had the good experience that one of the less active members who did not seem very excited earlier in the week made it out to church and stayed all three hours, which was very nice.

Slightly more serious P-day Photo

Goofy P-day fun!

Some photos from p-day.

Okay. I had a very interesting study this week on prayer and meaningfully waiting for an answer to the same. I tried throughout the week to place my mind in the state it needs to be of calm and sensitivity in order to receive spiritual answers to my prayers. It allowed me to really examine the weight of emotional turbulence that builds up and how many things can be distractions from the smooth, soft voice of the spirit.

Well, I don't have much more to write. Have a good, safe week everyone!

El. Backstrom

I am including an excerpt from an e-mail Dallin sent me that I thought some of you might enjoy:

How are the Oilers doing? still losing embarrassingly?  What about Montreal, are they still doing pretty good?

Hockey. It's so weird to explain hockey to people here because they're like, ah, yes, field hockey for women. I think I understand. but it is completely different blah.

Well since you have no questions- what did I do this week? well, on Friday it rained really hard and we got drenched and then finally got back to the pension only to have a less active member knock on our door and tell us her son had fallen eight meters our of a tree that same morning and fractured one vertebrae and so we scarfed down our food and went as fast as we could to the Italian clinic in the center to give him a blessing. he's a very nice man. he said that the doctors had told him that really a fall of that height had come cheap for him. pity he lives outside of our area, or we might just have had the chance to teach him.

Well, that was a little bit of my week- have a good one. I saw dad has a beard. it's pretty great. did you know I can grow a beard now? it makes me quite pleased

The Time is Far Spent... There will be even less for e-mails every week!

So, this week came with sad news. now and on-wards I have only 45 mins. to write all my emails! this means that you can expect the weekly email to come a good deal slimmer since it does take a bit of time to read all the emails that come every week... which I enjoy a lot so please don't send less emails in order obtain a longer weekly update...

Well, we had an asado today.

Me...

Elder Backstrom with the Asado meat

My Companion Elder Enriquez is from Trujio, Peru. From the same ward (and a good friend of) elder Fernandez, Another Elder I was companions with. My third Peruvian companion in a row. He was a semi-semi-professional football player (Basically, he can kick your but, but he'll never get paid to do it at home), however he injured a foot in the mission and still can't play.

He has been out on his mission for 16 months. He's a little crazy, like everyone. He likes asado. everyone likes asado.

Elder Enriquez with the Asado meat

Also attached are a few pictures of a plaza here.

The Plaza

Elder Backstrom in the Plaza

Well, this week, we washed cars at a stop light. we washed their windshields, to be precise. but then the people were startled because they thought that we were going to charge them or rob them so we just started giving away pass along cards and pamphlets at the stoplight instead. it was really fun. the sister missionaries went with us and took some photos, I will try and obtain them.

This week, I started reading through preach my gospel again in addition to my study of the doctrine and covenants, and when I read the chapter 2 it reminded me of many things I could do to make my study more worthwhile, especially the usage of my study journal which I have but I've sort of stopped using regularly. It is good to remind oneself how to study once in a while!

Well have a good week,

El. Backstrom

How Ikea can be an analogy for the commandments of God, who knew!

Well it has been a very interesting week for me.

First, we had to purchase and construct from flat packs several pieces of furniture for the new apartment we are in.

Okay. I just want to say something, to get it out there: be grateful for IKEA. Yeah. seriously. You have no idea how much you'll miss those wordless cartoony instructions that never make any sense to the natural man but somehow guide you to a complete piece of furniture if you follow them with faith- you have no idea- until they're gone. and your left with a piece of imitation Ikea furniture with instructions that leave it looking like this when it's finished:

because you accidentally used the wooden plugs in holes that turned out to be for screws because the instructions told you to put in the wrong number of plugs and left you without the supplies to finish the drawers. and also probably arthritis in your wrist from putting in and taking out again so many screws because the instructions couldn't quite figure out what they wanted you to put in first.

What we can learn from this? well, I saw in it a metaphor for the commandments of God. sometimes, just like the Ikea instructions, they don't make sense to us. we question why we're putting on the doors first and going to church every Sunday and not drinking coffee. but if we follow precisely the commandments, everything falls together in the end, because even though we can't, God can see the end from the beginning. sort of like the Ikea people. especially with those Akurum cabinets. But no the other hand, if we take wrong instructions in our spiritual construction, whether it be from our own disobedience or looking to the wrong source for our guidance, we end up having to take steps backwards and get extra parts and sometimes even replace damaged pieces. Luckily, all of that is possible through the Atonement of Jesus Christ (or the returns and exchanges desk, depending on which metaphor you're working with.)

Well in other things we did this week, we have had several of the people we were working with disappear, so we ended up "touching some doors", which was actually really fun. When I started my mission it was something that I really didn't like doing, and tried to avoid. but I've developed my language and confidence skills a little more, and now when I knock on people's doors I enjoy it a lot, because I have a technique called "Bombard with cheerfulness" and it makes for interesting reactions, and sometimes equally cheerful replies.

Well, have good weeks. everyone.

El. Backstrom out.

also photos.

How to cook a pig (literally)

After a whole two weeks of writing, we're back again with another weekly update from Argentina.

To explain; I did not write last week due to a very occupied day involving roast pig.

Pictures attached.

I have a new companion as of Thursday; Elder Enriquez. Elder Inca went to San Juan (poor thing) and we will be staying in amppya.

Speaking of which, we changed apartments this week and are now living in a very much smaller location that... doesn't quite have the glamour of the house we were in before. To explain: the property has two apartments, a house and then a small attached apartment. A member was living in the apartment and changed us for the house. the little apartment has two rooms and a bathroom. there is an electric hot water heater. its sort of goofy and small, but way livable, so whatever.

This week I finished the bible in my reading, passed the entire pearl of great price, and got a few sections into the doctrine and covenants. Reading the book of Moses I was able to appreciate more the symbolic metaphor that the earth plays representing our lives and progress as taught by Enoch. 

Alright, so I have to go eat lunch now. later.

Short e-mail from a few weeks ago

Hi all -- so this is Dallin's mom. Dallin sent this e-mail a couple of weeks ago along with a couple of pictures that didn't work. I had asked him to resend the pics and was waiting to post this until he did... I have now given up and will post his two sentence e-mail without pictures!

This week we had interviews with the mission president. I also got a little sick early in the week (luckily didn't last long) so there was relatively little time that I spent in my area (also I was in exchanges in another area on Friday.)

Not much to tell this week I guess! I hope that all of you are doing well. I sort of have to go now, so have a good, safe, premeditated, enjoyable, balanced, spiritual, healthy, action-packed week-

Elder Backstrom