Yet another holiday...‏

Hey everyone!

As one of the citizens on Oncativo said to us earlier this week, one of the problems with this country is the amount of holidays. I`m not saying that it`s necessarily a problem, but sometimes an inconvenience for those humble missionaries who`d like to talk to their friends and family. But hey, at least today the Ciber is open!

So this week was really good. We had interviews with Presidente Ruben B.  Alliaud. He is so cool! Did you know he used to be an area 70 down here? He even has articles in the Ensign and Liahona. It is my first real interview (I had one the day I arrived, but that one hardly counts). That was really good for me because he taught me a lot of really profound things in a very short amount of time, and I now feel empowered to "fix it" :) After our interviews we got to eat lunch with a bunch of other missionaries and that`s always a lift for the spirits. It`s really a great experience just to be around so many other missionaries. We laughed and laughed. Elder Smart (a relatively new Elder from Washington) taught me some awesome card tricks! I think I need a deck of cards now...apparently they´re not exactly contraband if you use them the right way haha

The first day of fall was so cold!! The day before was nice and warm, but apparently it means it when it´s suddenly fall. We had to put another blanket on our beds and wear socks at night. It´s nice to feel a little bit of cold, it´s actually been a really long time for me since I´ve felt it. We watched the Restoration with familia Cepeda and I missed the snow!!!! It´s shocking, but true. The other thing I miss is carpet...We started talking about carpet with Familia Daniele at lunch today, and they can hardly imagine having to clean carpet and take care of it! I found it pretty funny. Their daughter Rebeca is returning from her mission tonight!!! They`ll pick her up at 1 am in Còrdoba. They are all so very excited and we can´t help but join in! We hope that Rebeca will want to go all over Oncativo with us, so that should be really fun :)

Hermana Salmeron reminds me a lot of Boston. She has a lot of the same mannerisms and at the same time she isn`t Boston, so maybe that´s what`s been bothering me. I don´t know exactly what I said last week that everyone was concerned that we didn´t get along very well. It isn´t that we didn´t get along, it was just a little more work than with Hermana Regalado. We ironed out a few issues and we`re up and running as a team. We even want to get bicycles here in Oncativo so that we can do a lot more stuff :) It´ll be great...after my legs adjust to biking! But we probably won´t get them for another week or so.

Yesterday we went to the Branch activity with the Elders in our district. We played soccer with the young men and their friends, and of course, I had a blast :D The crazy thing was that we had some strange things happen. When we first got there one of the less actives had a ceizure and pretty much everyone panicked and no one knew what to do. I was even a little bit shaken, it was my first real ceisure. We laid him on his side because that´s how he fell and called an ambulance, waited while he stopped shaking and then monitered breathing until the ambulance got there. I forget what a blessing it is to have some training in first aid...and the DON´T PANIC. After that the games went on until one of the young women stepped in an ant hill. She has allergies to the ant stings and had trouble breathing, so they took her to the hospital too, but not in an ambulance. Then hermana Salmeron got sunscreen in her eye... man, it was an interesting activity. Really though, there just isn´t the same kind of availability for first aid classes here.

It was also stake conference here and so it was fun to go to Còrdoba to here Presidente Alliaud and Daniele speak! The temple open house starts the 16th of April and the dedication is the 16th of May! I´m so excited!!! Also, the Buenos Aires temple is currently down for the count due to a power surge or something, just on the theme of temple news.

Well, I´m doing great, and although it´s pouring rain here I´m happy :) Hope you all have a wonderful week and know that you´re loved and blessed!

Love,

Hermana Swan

PS. All of the Hermanas get to help with the TEMPLE OPENHOUSE!!! XD I´ll send more news when I get it, but I`m just so excited!!!