Trip to Capital...

WHATS NEW EVERYBODY?!?! Hope all is well!

This week Hna. Romo and I were able to travel to the offices in San Fernando and meet up with all the missionaries that needed to travel to Capital for all of our paperwork for becoming an official Argentine. Its quite the process. It was so nice to finally talk to everyone since I can speak Castellano (arg. spanish) much more fluently now haha. We got to talk with the new couple that replaced the Kroff´s and they are pretty overwhelmed with everything so far but they are doing a pretty great job at staying calm. Everyone in the offices has to remain calm to stay sain and they all seem to do it so well. Its impressive haha. I hope to be able to learn the attributes of Elder Peterson when I return home. That Elder could be hanging off of a cliff and he would still be as calm and collected as ever haha.

 I had the great privledge of getting to know the other Sister Missionaries much better and it was SO NICE to be able to do that since we are always surrounded by Elders the majority of the time, it was nice to get the girls together and talk of all the miracles we have been seeing in our areas. I met Hermana Lyons who is AWESOME! Shes from Colorado Springs and shes darling I told we have to hang out after the mission. Traveling to Capital is always a good adventure. On our back we let our newer Elders from our area talk us into taking a "short cut" back home and that turned into us getting so lost in Capital looking for one collectivo bus amongst 100,000 others racing around the worlds largest bus stop filled with billions of people. We saw some pretty crazy stuff. Long story short we ended up walking to the train stop instead and getting on a train. Luckily we didnt finish one of our sandwiches we got because in the train station we found a very poor family with starving children. I saw the little baby in a diaper eating styrofome and I bent down to look at her and ask her where her mother was. I told her not to eat that stuff and then her sister came and told me that they only have that to eat... it was true because all the other family had been eating it also. My sweet companion pulled out our sandwich and gave it to the young kids and it disappeared in a matter of seconds. I felt so helpless. I wanted to give them clothes and everything and I wanted to take those children and give them a bath but they were only one family of millions that crossed our path who needed food so badly. It broke my heart and humbled me, as the mission often does. I hope to always remember how I have felt in these moments so I might always want to give to everyone. On the train as we left Capital I saw all the incredibly bad villas filled with garbage and homeless families and then in the midst of all the mess in the far distance, I saw two glowing white shirts!!!! I saw Elders walking and I smiled so big. Among all the despair we have angels who are sacraficing so much to live in all of this and take these people out of darkness to make them saints and bring them everlasting hope! What a beautiful thing it is to be a part of such a large service all around the world and to think that we are all in this together in the church. MISSIONARY WORK ROCKS!

  This whole week we have been feeling really sick over some food we ate and over the changes in the weather. The mission sure does take a toll on you. With the Tsunami in Japan and Chile on watch for one also everyone is still talking about the end of the world and we are trying to explain that for this very reason, we cannot procrastinate our decision of action. We must act NOW, we must help others and help ourselves NOW, we must all cling tight to the iron rod. In a world with so many calamities and so much sorrow, we need light. We need people who spend less time worrying about having the latest fashions and are more concerned with taking care of others and paying it forward. I never eat food without being grateful for every bite now, because I have seen so many children who starve and cry because of the pain of such hunger. "true success is not in what we TAKE UP but what WE GIVE UP"

   Olga, who we considered to be the "perfect investigator" really sucked all the energy out of me this week but it taught me a lesson. She called us her angels and said that she knew God sent us to her to bring her the truth shes always been searching for. She reads the Book of Mormon and says I KNOW THIS BOOK IS TRUE and I know Christ came here to the americas. She watched the first vision and almost cried. She exclaimed HERMOSO. meaning beautiful. she said she knows everything is true. So the next step was to set up a baptism date with her so that she may take Christs name upon her and come into the fold of gathered sheep and recieve a remission of all her past pain and sins. She starred at us and said no. she said shes been Catholic too long to change her religion and shes scared to commit to something else. She ended up dropping us because she said baptism scared her. We were really disappointed and kept blaming ourselves for what we might have done wrong but we are not going to give up hope we know that shes just confused right now and needs to continue reading on her own. we know she will see the true actions she should take and we are at peace that the Lord will guide her to do so.

  Lorena showed up for church again with all of her daughters WHOOO im so happy for her... Her husband is coming around and softening up to us, he says that he has seen a greater change of peace in his home with us and with her coming to church. He is going to talk to his work about not working during sacrament so he can come with his family but it will be a miracle if his work will work something out with him because he is a supervisor. They desire to be married as soon as possible so that Lorena may be baptized and they want to work towards a temple marriage. The only thing thats tought is the fact that marriage certificates are much longer of a process out here considering all the problems and time and travel that goes into it. We will do all we can to help. Also Flia Florez needs their papers to go through and we are in that process so they can also be baptized and go to the temple.

 ´Bringing food to our Bishop was a plus. He seems to trust and appreciate us even more and its great to see. Ive really reflected alot this week and its been great to do. Staying focused on this work is the most important thing for us to do. I do not want to return home and lose the characteristics I have learned on my mission. I want to make sure that they become who I am naturally so that I might be all the Lord wants me to be. As a wife, mother, sister, daughter, and as a friend. I want to always be a missionary at heart. Letting virtue garnish my thoughts unceasingly in all cases. This is my greatest wish on my mission for myself. Refining my life with patience, love and wisdom, step by step.

  Susanna will be getting baptized this upcoming Sunday and im so pumped about it. Her mother still needs to find a place to live in order to be baptized and she ís ever so anxious about it. Just as Holland has said, these people are not just baptismal statistics, they are real people, with real feelings and needs and they are all children of God. They need the peace that this gospel has to offer them for all of their needs and therefore baptism, is a process. Its hard hard hard mission work, taking a lot of time to bring forth a few miracles, but those few are golden. They are so rich and so worth it. We are just mining away to find the golden moments that do exsist and just need to be uncovered. The Lord makes it possible and we are just His instruments for His power to work through us. I cannot imagine not being a missionary. Not having a tag and not having a special setting apart that protects us. Its great to be a missionary.

  So heres some random things I wanted to tell you for your entertainment, my wonderful always so bright and watchful companion haha FELL INTO A SEWER when we were asking for directions hahaha she has a huge bruise on her leg it was scary until she popped out of it again and then we laughed harder than ever. Shes a great sport when it comes to laughing about stupid stuff that happens to us. We were walking down this street and had a strong feeling to move to the other side of the road, and right then, with no wind at all, a huge tree branch fell to the ground. If angels were not protecting us we would have definately had some damage haha. I had a crazy cramp in my leg in my sleep and in my dream I was like being attacked by an alligator in the zoo here, so I was literally dead asleep and I was in serious pain screaming in spanish haha my comp rushed over and was asking what was wrong... haha that was pretty funny to laugh about the next morning. So march madness is here eh, crazy, dont worry Im not thinking about how im missing out on it, im just telling you all that you better enjoy it for me. Love all of you guys so much, stay safe, pray always. xoxo 

til next week, chao for now I love you all

CON AMOR,

     Hermana Ashley Gillum