Apr 10, 2017

Hola 

This week was great we saw many miracles and many great stories too.  To start we got a baptism this Saturday and other one the next Saturday, it’s just too bad I’m being transferred to Villa Tesei tomorrow.  The one guy getting baptized this Saturday is a miracle though. The week we found him and started teaching him, his tires for his truck blew out like a day before so he couldn’t work but he is always busy busy. Even until today he hasn’t been able to completely fix the tire, but there would have been no way we would’ve been able to receive the lessons from us. His friend is also a convert and has a crazy story but he is now a bishop so he has also been helping him out. 

For another story my companion got robbed with me on Thursday but all the guy took was his agenda, it was pretty funny and a little scary but not too bad.  The dumb part of the story is on Saturday night we walk by the same corner at the same time of night and the same drunk guy comes up to us again and starts telling us that he has his agenda but we have to go to his house to pick it up............. so I think we’ll go back and get it hahahahaha, jokes what a trap hahah.  Sunday after church as well was pretty funny cause we saw a huge mob and it was just a big street fight on the same block as us so we were just like ‘ok let’s just turn the corner’ and as we reach the next corner the police pull over literally right in front of us and bust a bunch of kids for drugs so we turned again but it was so funny to see both that happen right in front of us back to back hahahahaha.  We also found out that our ward seminary teacher taught that you can pray to your heavenly mother if you want to sooooo ya hahah.

Great last week though in Los Pinos though two baptism coming up in the next two weeks I’m a little bummed that I miss out on it but headed for Villa Tesia and apparently they baptize a lot there so I’m pumped.  My new companion will be Elder Wihongi who is a New Zelander!!! nuts hey.  Our area is also kinda close to the Furete Apache so who knows if I’ll do divisions there or not but I’m pumped right now just so happy in the mission. I really don’t think I want to leave the mission it’s just the best here. 

con amor Elder Maller 

Apr 3, 2017

Hola

We had a pretty sweet week and things are slowly going back up in this area!  Lots of miracles that will take a while to explain but we are finding people in the weirdest of ways. We found a part member family that the ward has no records of them and will probably baptize the kids in a few weeks. I went on divisions with Elder Enriquez in La Tablada and we hit up a few of the villas again hahah.  A little sketchy this time, we heard a couple gun shots in the streets but it’s all good no pasa nada.  Everyone who lives there just lives the most unimaginable life, it effects them mentally pretty bad.  I’ve also learned how valuable my casio watch is.  I could probably sell it for 4500 pesos if I wanted to which is like 300 dollars US haha.  Its because there is so much fake merchandise here it’s crazy.

General Conference was good I was able to understand it pretty well, we almost we able to watch it in English but the wifi wasn’t good enough.  It was kinda funny though because Elder Rasband shared a few of the same things when he came and visited us; like the story of the 2 elders in the restaurant.  The talk by that Seventy that is from Buenos Aires was pretty good to but I gotta say my favorite was by President Monson because our mission has had a ton of training lately on using the Book of Mormon in the mission and it was great to hear the truths he shared.  The Book of Mormon is so important I’ve never realized it truly bring us towards Christ in this life. I hope you all have a great week chow

Elder Maller 

Mar 27, 2017

Hola 

5 months!! This week was pretty good.  Thursday we had a huge training day by president and his wife and then right after we went to the temple. I was able to see Elder Dosdall, my MTC companion and he has lost like 15 pounds! He looks like he is gonna die.  Apparently he still hasn’t eaten any meat so far so he is flaco flaco. Sunday morning was pretty nuts, we were walking through the street and a pack of dogs all ganged up on one dog.  It looked like he was a goner to.  One dog had him by the neck another by the ear and another at its legs and they were just trying to rip it apart it was nuts.  Thankfully a car came up honking and tried to run them over to scare them all off and thankfully he got away but he almost lost an ear.  These dogs were huge its soo crazy when you seem them actually want to kill each other.

Recently President counseled the mission to teach the Book of Mormon first.  This has been pretty effective, actually everyone is understanding the importance of lesson one.   We even had an investigator who we have been working with for a while finally come to church and we think it’s because he finally gets what the Book of Mormon is all about.  It’s a pretty sweet time as a missionary right now, with conference coming up and for a number of different reasons but the mission is pretty hyped right now for it. President is gonna head into his last transfer in a week or two.  We had an interview and he told me I’ll probably be leaving Los Pinos, so I’m pretty excited to see what happens next transfer.  Hope all is well 

con amor Elder Maller 

Mar 20, 2017

Hola - Not much to say about this week. I finally feel all settled into the new pench and we seem to be getting back into a rhythm.  We have been seeing a few cool things happen recently.  I fasted this week and the week before just for a few people in the area and I can say now that we are better able to understand their needs and help them out a bit better.  We have also noticed a lot of power from pray this week.  Its helped us teach better find better and just be happier.  It was funny the other day we went to go look for and investigator who told us just to knock on his door until he gets up so he could come to church so we did.  We knocked and knocked and then we started sing hymns and then songs from the movie frozen in Spanish.  He eventually got up but he wasn’t too happy and in the end he didn’t come to church.  Church was good though we had ward council and we got some good plans happy about that.  I’m sure missionaries say this a lot but members are key to baptisms, if you don’t use the members you will almost never get a baptism.  Today has been pretty fun though, we played some soccer with some Bolivians, they were not even that good.  The only bad part about today is my comp likes to sing so he has to go do choir practice.  But this week we get to go to the temple on Thursday!!!!!!!  pretty pumped, I’ll be sure to take some photos for that but hope all is good up there. Chow 

Elder Maller

Mar 13, 2017

Hola.  This week was a little stressful, not gonna lie.  On Wednesday we called the pench (office) secretary to see when we were supposed to move in and right after he was like hmmm why not tomorrow?  So we just had to ditch all our planes for that day and get ready to move everything in about 24 hours notice haha.  I think only missionaries could pull this off btw.  It’s funny, I took a picture of all the stuff we actually live out of and it’s not that much somos pobres haha.  That day we moved just about everything in but the office Elders had to leave a little early so we finished the next two days but those two days were awful.  I’m starting to understand the importance of cleanliness because we couldn’t just feel the spirit with all the boxes and everything being all scrambled.  Thankfully as of last night everything is back to normal.  Yesterday we also had Stake Conference which was pretty good.  President and Hermana Robertson spoke at it.  President also put on a family home evening for all our investigators in the zone.  I’m gonna miss President, can’t believe he goes home at the end of the next transfers nuts eh. Last night, because we live right above the other elders of Atalaya Ward we had a banana pancake dinner with candles haha and because we live above them too we go play soccer every morning its sooo fun.  All in all it turned out to be a pretty good week.  Hope it’s starting to warm up for you guys haha, here it’s pretty cold in the morning. Have a great week y’all

Mar 6, 2017

Hola Elder Jacobson and I are off to a great start!  He is a pretty cool guy, sort of a mix of Boston Shipley and Connor Cameron.  He is from Arizona and he is basically a cowboy.  He makes whips and they’re pretty sick.  Were gonna have an activity and make some soon, but if you throw an apple in the air he could make it explode with the whip, it’s soooo awesome.  Other than that Elder Jacobson is cien por cien focused.  He works hard and we really are just hoping to rock this area; pretty exciting stuff.  Today we found a Burger King!!! hype eh.  I knew I had to get a whopper except it was 160 pesos which is kinda expensive for food but its good stuff.  Something cool happened the other day.  If you remember me talking about one eternal investigator hermana Corzo, we were able to find out that she had depression and she said the missionaries never knew this about her and there is no record of this in the teaching records.  She said that the missionaries before were just like “when are you getting baptized!! when are you getting baptized!!” and apparently this made things worse.  But we were able to talk to here all about it and now she says she’s gonna send in all the papers to get married so she can get baptized!!!  She even said she wants to get baptized the same day she gets married!!!!  We are now gonna start working with the son so the both can get baptized same time but will see how thing go.  We are pretty hopeful, crazy though she has been investigating for almost 9 years now!  

I’m doing really great and am so happy to be here.  Any youth reading this know that this is truly where you want to be.  We never should fear doing good in any area it applies but it’s especially true in the mission.  I love you all and hope you guys have a great week!  

Feb 27, 2017

Hola.  Transfers!!  Elder Udall is going to the Marcos Paz district and Elder Maller is staying in Los Pinos with Elder Jacobson!!!!  Just found out like 5 minutes ago.  I’m gonna stay in Los Ppinos for another transfer with Elder Jacobson, don’t know much about him except he is from Arizona. He is  gonna be the district leader also. I’ve heard a lot of good things about him so far from the other missionaries. He’s a pretty calm guy but loves to work, which is just what we need.  I have been really happy these past few weeks, it’s just been really easy to live in the moment out here even though this area isn’t having a lot of success and were still struggling to bring people to church. The mission really is great I worry sometimes that I’m not gonna learn all that there is to be learned out here or do all the that Lord wants and needs me to do out here because really time out here fly’s by.  Btw I hit 4 months today!  It may seem to you guys like I’ve been away forever haha, but I seriously get nervous about the time here and how it works because when a moment passes it’s gone - like now. I would say this week has also been the worst for weather so far especially because they shut off our water and then our electricity and those nights were pretty hot without a fan.  Hottest day this week was 42 degrees with humidity! 

Love Elder Maller