June 15 Letter

Hello mis queridos =)
This week was basically Hermana Shumway and Hermana Gonzalez practicing Murphey's Law. First, we had transfers last week. We were all expecting the calls on Monday night as usual when SUPRISE we get a call from our distric leader at 10 telling us that transfers would be Tuesday...WHAT?! Hermana Brown got transferred to a little place called Arroyito and I'm now with Hermana Gonzalez from Paraguay. I lived with her my last transfer in Rio Cuarto when she was being trained by Hermana Santos, who I'd been living with since I arrived in Argentina. Guess where Hermana Santos is? In Carlos Paz! She lives with me again so now all three of us are living together in the same pension once again! How lovely! This was lovely, but the surprise transfer calls were not. Second, Hugo was supposed to get baptized on Saturday, but we found out it was stake conference this week so if he got baptized on Saturday, he'd have to wait until the following week to receive the Holy Ghost...uh...not gonna happen. That gives Satan WAY too much time to do his sneaky dirty work. Third, we were supposed to meet with a man that has a pension for us in Villa Independencia at 12 on Thursday. We have our planning meeting on Thursday mornings. No big deal right? All you do is leave the pension a little earlier from the planning meeting and there you go! NOT! We were waiting for a collectivo for a long time and when one finally came it said "Juncal" I thought, oh perfect, we'll take this collectivo to Juncal (a street in Villa) and walk the rest of the way, no problem. Where did this collectivo take us? All over the mountain on the other side of the river in the center of Carlos Paz. We were on that thing for 40-45 minutes and brought us right back to where we started. I was so frustrated and I felt like a big fat idiot. Apparently Juncal is also a little pueblito on the mountain. So lame. We missed the appointment with the guy and our lunch appointment. Fourth, the collectivo drivers had a strike this week on Friday and Saturday, so what did Hermana Shumway and Hermana Gonzalez do? They put on their best game faces and walked 30 minutes to their area. It was fun all things considered =)...Fun?? Now, Hermana Shumway, I wouldn't jump right in on using the 'fun' word, don't you remember what happend Friday night? Oh yes, I remember. Hermana Gonzlez had to go to the bathroom so we walked to the church to take care of business. The lock on the door to the main building of the church is a little bit harder to unlock than your average lock. It wouldn't unlock. I thought, oh, no biggie, I'll open the door to the relief society room and I can disarm the alarm from in there. We got the door open but to our very disappointing suprise, there was no number pad to disarm the alarm that we had just set off. The only number pad is in the building I was trying to open before and that door wouldn't unlock. Don't worry, after a wile the alarm stopped. All is well right?...not right. The police came. They asked us what we were doing there and blah blah blah then asked a really really irrelevant question, they looked at me and said, "What's your name?" I told them and then they asked, "Where are you from" I couldn't see any reason why that was necessary, but I told them and they said, "Whatever you need, let us know." I said okay, but really I was thinking, yeah right, my three year-old nephew would be a better police officer than you pal. Does the list stop here? Nope. Fifth, Saturday we had our zone meeting. We were supposed to get to our Zone Leaders' area in Cruz Del Eje by 2:30 meaning Hermana Gonzalez and I would have to leave here by 12. We were finishing up our planning meeting and our district leader calls and says, "Hermana, get down to the terminal right now and find out if there are any busses going there right now because in our area, there aren't any." Let me explain, no, there is too much, let me sum up (hahaha name that movie), the collectivo drivers ended their strike at 12 noon on Saturday which means a lot of the main busses from Córdoba wouldn't arrive in Carlos Paz until 1 or later. There were no busses in our terminal headed for Cruz Del Eje either. After much deliberation, and an hour later, our zone leaders and my district leader decided to have the meeting in La Falda, my district leader's area. We bought our tickets and waited for our bus for about 25 minutes. The bus arrived and come to find out, the man in the window had sold too many tickets for the bus we were supposed to get on. Did we get on it? No. We got our money back for the tickets we just bought and bought tickets for another one that left 40 minutes later. After the meeting, we tried to get the very very next bus back to Carlos Paz for our appointment with Hugo. Did we make it? Nope. Sixth, we passed by for Joana to go to Stake conference with us yesterday, but when we got to her house, she opened the door and told us she was a little bit sick and had some things she had to take care of with her family that day. When we were walking to the church to meet the bus, we saw a dead dog that looked like it had been tortued and had a gray plastic bag around it. I hate dogs...but I would never torture one. I almost lost my breakfast. When we got to the church, our branch president says, "oh, hermanas, I wasn't expecting you to be here, usually all four of you travel to stake conference together." SINCE WHEN?!?!?!?!? Because we went, one of the hermanas from the ward couldn't go. She was very willing to give up her seat, but I felt sooooo bad. Our lunch appointment fell through and we intruded on one of the counselors of the branch presidency and his family for lunch. I felt bad at first, but then they made me eat cow tongue that actually looked like cow tongue. It was DISGUSTING. It was a rough week, but I don't care. Satan didn't get his slimy hands on Hugo to make him doubt. He's still getting baptized this Saturday and he's very ready. I had the whole amazing story about it last week, but considering I lost my e-mail, you don't know about it! I hope everyone has a really amazing week! Linsey and Audrey, have fun on the trek. We're lucky we got our dad's strong genes to help us look those rocky hills in the face and laugh! I loved the trek! Have fun sleeping in the dirt! =) I love you all!
Hermana Shumway