December 18, 2017

Sit down...BE HUMBLE

Well world, I'm short on time as always but I thought I'd take this time to repent and tell you all a story. I think my last email gave you all the impression I speak Spanish already. Well, that very day we went to a dinner appointment and the Lord humbled me hard. It was with two old gauchos (cowboys) and they speak really heavy and I didn't understand a thing and I made a fool of myself trying to respond confidently. So yeah, the language is still a work in progress but at the same time I can function so don't worry too much about me! 

 

The other quick story was this Thursday we spent all day contacting doors, all our plans failed and the sun about killed me. It was a brutal day and right at the end of it, we contacted a door and this is how it started "Hello how are you?" and he responded "BAD!! He doesn't hear me!!" well we took some time and talked to this guy. Turns out he was actually baptized 30 years ago in our church and he felt God had stopped listening to him. We talked about the entire plan of Salvation and it was such a good experience. It's hard to explain but every single question he had, we had a scripture and response. His name is Carlos and we're gonna head back over this week. I'll let y'all know if anything more develops but he told us he's gonna read in his Book of Mormon and pray for the first time in 25 years so that's amazing!!

Well that's about it for me. I hope you all have a very very FELIZ NAVIDAD and look for ways to put the Savior in the center of your lives. 

Con amor

Elder Nixon

I don't have a new photo from this week so here's an old one I may or may not have already sent. I really dunno to be honest I just think it's dope. We're at one of the only touristy spots in Rosario and it's under construction so that was a bummer but I got time to see it how it normally is. It's some sort of flag monument.

December 11, 2017

Left to Dry

First things first, Huge shout out to my parents for the wedding anniversary this week!! Ok, now that that's out of the way I can complain about how stinking hot it is here. It's killing me. We were up close to 100 degrees this week with killer humidity. Our little fans in our pension can't spin fast enough! 

This week I had my first experience as a senior companion. We had divisions (splits?) this week and I was assigned to go out with a brand new Elder from Chicago. He speaks really good for a new yankee, but still my Spanish was our best chance of survival. Not only did we survive, we thrived and had a really successful day. 

The other fun thing this week was our branch's ward Christmas party. The only problem was this culture doesn't wake up til 9 at night so that's when the party started. Our curfew is 9:30 so we didn't get to celebrate much but we did steal some pretty good chicken and bubbly to eat in our pension. We also watched a First Presidency message from Uchtdorf and that was the highlight for me. I understood almost all of it and loved when he said something about it's not about where you are, but the spirit in your heart. So go ahead and remember the Reason for the season and enjoy some cold weather for me!!!

Con amor,

Elder Nixon

sorry for the quality of the photos but one is me and Elder Mallett setting up our Christmas tree and lights we bought. Sadly it's one of the biggest trees I've seen here. The other is the food we stole from the ward activity!!

December 4, 2017

I was a great first week of the transfer! Elder Mallett and I definitely have a plate's full with managing what used to be done by 4 Elders. We had set appointments every hour of the day this week which is RARE so definitely could say we're moving fast here. 

I had a pretty fun experience Thursday in our District Meeting. Our new district has 3 brand new Yankees that don't speak English so they asked me to translate the whole thing to English for them. I was scared, to be honest, but to my delight I was able to do like 95% of it all and even didn't know how to say some things in English anymore. I definitely don't speak great Spanish, but I'm at a point where I can survive so it's been fun lately with that barrier coming down slowly but surely. 

I had a pretty powerful experience this week with an investigator named Celia. She's been investigating for over 2 years and has a testimony but needs to get married before she can be baptized. We shared Moroni 7 with her and talked about faith to work miracles. The spirit was super strong and it really was a great lesson. After the closing prayer, she started to cry when she looked up at us and told us "Ustedes son angeles sobre la tierra" You are angels over the earth. The spirit hit me so hard in that moment. I realized I represent the Savior and to these people, we are literally angels sent to help them. Then this morning I listened to a talk by Elder Holland called "The Ministry of Angels" He talks about how each of us can be angels one to another. So that's my Christmas challenge to each of you. Find a way to be an Angel sent by God to help someone else. I love what my uncle told me today. Christmas isn't about all the lights and snow (which I don't have) it's about the SAVIOR and how we can remember Him

Remember Him by doing what He needs you to do. Be an angel for someone else this Holiday season :)

I love you all so much. Have a very Merry Christmas and always remember the REASON FOR THE SEASON!!!

I couldn't resist finding a way to use my hammock here. If you don't have to stop- DONT!!! The other pic is me and my comp moving all our stuff to the other pension with the help of a member!! 

November 27, 2017

Thanksgiving?

Well world, if you wanna know what it's like the wake up and go an entire day before realizing it's Thanksgiving, I could tell you. It was a weird feeling in the middle of my night prayer coming to realize that it's Thanksgiving. 

But now as our attention turns to Christmas I just hope you all make the most of this time to turn outward and serve others and just love the world. there is so much good in it and yet so much need for even more. I hope you all determine to be the good the world needs this Holiday season!

This week was a good one. We had transfers today and they were pretty weird for me. They closed the neighboring area and put it in mine. They also made me comps with Elder Mallett who has been in my district from day 1 so we already know each other really well. This time, however, there's not a soul my district who speaks English so it's kinda survival now. So yeah, that's how transfers went. We have an entire city to tract and a TON of walking to do. I also have to move where I live to go to the other pension which is a pain but what you gonna do?

This week we saw some miracles. We have an investigator named Ruben who is progressing so dang fast. Every time we leave him a pamphlet or a part of the Book of Mormon to read, he reads it 2 or 3 times that same night. He's almost stopped smoking in just a week and has changed so much already. The gospel changes lives!!!

Con amor,

Elder Nixon

This is me and a sunset and one of the loca familias that have been progressing so much!

November 20, 2017

Thanksgiving and Being Poor

Well, a lot of you have asked me if I have Thanksgiving and if you can believe it, Argentina doesn't celebrate pilgrims surviving in America. It's a real shame but what'll you do? Today is a holiday though. Don't ask me what it's called or why they celebrate it but no one is working or going to school today. That's another fun thing about the culture here. There is literally a holiday every other week and no one ever knows why but they know they don't have to work!!

Last P-day was pretty interesting. We went to the city so my comp could by some souvenirs before going home this next week. While there we got really hungry but couldn't find a restaurant anywhere. Eventually we found one and just sat down without thinking we were so hungry. Let's just say when they handed us our menu we knew we were out of our league. They charged us 40 pesos just to use their silver wear. But yeah, we stayed and ate there all the same. It was funny to see 4 poor missionaries eating in this super nice place. Everyone kinda looked at us funny but whatever. I don't have any more money to buy groceries, but the experience is worth it right? When else am I going to buy a 200 peso Milanesa?

The best part of this week however was seeing some of our long time investigators finally start making some real progress. It's happening because they're finally reading the Book of Mormon on their own. Let me just remind you all that the key to spiritual development is consistent daily acts! 

It's a great time to be alive people! Go out and do some good in the world today :)

Con amor, 

Elder Nixon

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL

One of us eating at Don Ferreros, another with a crazy ward member doing service 

November 13, 2017

Monotony

Well world I really don't have much to say this week. It was a super routine week but still really good at the same time. The heat here is starting to straight kill me and I'm told it's not even bad yet. I guess to fill some space I'll tell you all some more about the culture here cuz that's always kinda interesting to hear about right? Before that though, huge shout out to my sister Meghann for making me an uncle this week! Uncle Elder Nixon. I think it has a pretty great ring to it.

If you don't know what the siesta is, you're probably going to be jealous of it. Pretty much what it is is every day from 1-6 the whole country just goes to sleep. The businesses close and literally no one is in the streets. We ususally do our studies then or meet with members. Um, men think the world is their toilet here and seeing women breast feeding is nothing. Also last Sunday Boca played against River (a huuuugee rivalry) and literally no one would even answer the door to talk to us during it. So yeah, soccer is HUGE here and everyone wants to know who you support. For me it's Rosario Central or nothing....

Yeah sorry this email is so lame but I gotta run. We're going to Rosario for Pday today to do some souvenier shopping for my comp who is going home after this transfer so maybe I'll buy myself something nice :)

Elder Nixon

Here's just a pic of us outside our pension. Yes, that is some razor wire on our neighbors fence. Welcome to Argentina.

November 6, 2017

More drunks, pass along cards and Halloween

Hola mundo! Dang I won't lie to you all, language is at a weird point right now for me. I can pretty much understand what people are saying to me finally but I can't really talk back too effectively. And all at the same time it's been so long that I've really had a solid conversation in English that lots of times English feels weird in my mouth too. So basically right now I don't have a language I'm proficient in but what ya gonna do?? :)

       Well Halloween was depressing for me because I didn't realize it was Halloween until 6 in the afternoon but once I realized what day it was, Elder Gagnon and I switched nametags and I was Elder Gagnon for Halloween! We also went to a sweet shop and I bought myself lots of alfojores so that was nice.

       We met a pretty cool drunk dude this week. He yelled at us to come over and just started begging us to help him change his life. We told him we'd bring him to church with us and he loved the idea but when we came Sunday morning to get him, he was too hung over to be woken up by our loud clapping and knocking so we eventually just gave up.

       We had a hard day as far as the work goes. Our best investigador Angel straight up moved within a day on us. Like we had dinner with his family one night and during the conversation he told us "oh yeah, I leave tomorrow morning to go live with my dad in Santa Fe." So yeah, that was really hard but hopefully he keeps on learning and progressing!!

Also huge shout out to my mom for her birthday this last week. She's incredible and I love her so much!!!

Elder Nixon

The first pic is what happens on a p-day after playing soccer way to hard in the sun. You make a sofa out of your mattresses and buy a kilo of ice cream and put a fan in front of your face. The second pic is me and Elder Gagnon wearing each other's name tags. The dude's a stud and definitely a really good friend to me!

October 30, 2017

Drunks, pass along cards and questions

Hola familia y amigos! Como andan con ustedes? Sometimes I feel like I need to write just a little bit in Spanish just so every single word isn't underlined in red so if you can't understand that just throw it in Google translate and it will probably mess up what it actually means but if you could find out what it means you'd realize it's super anti-climatic anyways so yeah....

Um it was another pretty basic week but really good too. I guess one of the highlights would be one day we were doing service for a member digging up tree roots (which felt pointless but we got blessings so oh well) and while we were digging this dude came by riding his bike. He was so drunk he fell off his bike and we had to go pick him up and he just laid in the middle of the road until someone called the police to get him. So yeah, that was kinda fun I guess.

We had divisions with the zone leaders this week again. They're super good guys and so that's always fun to have them come spend the day with us. We got pretty bored right before bed so we had a pass along card throwing competition. What resulted was we literally threw every single pass along card we own (which is a TON) at a balloon in an effort to pop it. We succeeded eventually but made a huge mess so there was a trade off I guess!!

On more of a spiritual note, we had a really good experience with Talia and Angel and everyone in la familia Loca. I dunno how much I've wrote you all about them but pretty much they are this ginormous family that is loud and proud and has pretty much every problem imaginable but we work a lot with them and they're really good friends. We had a lesson with them this week that was super powerful. We came by and they were all outside drinking mate so we sat around and joined em. What made the lesson so good was they had lots of questions and we just had more of a conversation than a lesson and we all learned so much more that way. So if you ever need to learn something, learn to ask questions and search for the answers. This gospel is built on asking questions and then finding the answers through God. 

Con amor

Elder Nixon

This is actually the only picture I took this week which is sad. It's what we made for dinner one night. What it is is a cake made out of egg and potatoes and yeah it's weird.

October 23, 2017

Tea Time with Elder Gagnon

Hello beautiful outside world! I had a real good week to be honest. My new companion, Elder Gagnon, is an answer to prayers. The guy is a stud. We know how to work hard play hard for sure.

       Last Monday was kinda like a blue moon for us missionaries. We had a holiday fall on a p-day which never happens. I dunno what holiday it even was but I do know there was a pretty neat little fair that we were allowed to go to and buy ghetto stuff we don't need so that was way fun. There was a man there who did something called spacepainting. What it basically is is he takes spraypaint and makes these insane landscape paintings with em. They made me think of you Jed and all your spraypainting adventures!! We couldn't resist so we bought two each for cheap and hung them up in our pension. We also found an old nature calendar and put all those pictures up too. So yeah you could say we're making the pension a home. We also put our weekly plans on the window in whiteboard marker and put up a ton of dots on our map. Oh yeah and Elder Gagnon burns incense. So yeah, definitely breaking in the pension.

     I think I had my favorite visit we have ever had this week. We were walking by this old guy and we told him "good day" and he quickly spat back "what's so good about it? I'm 85 years old and have already died twice!" So of course, we went back and talked to him. Imagine a stereotypical old sailor and that's exactly what this guy looked like and was! I dunno how, but we ended up going in his house and there was cobwebs and dust everywhere. I legit thought I was talking to a ghost. It was so dang weird it was awesome. He told us about his pact with the devil he made and how he wants to be the secretary in hell. Then he showed us a massive scar on his stomach where he had all his intestines taken out and cleaned then put back in. It was just straight creepy. We're gonna go back this week too ;)

Well, the thing I look forward to every day now is tea time. Tea time takes place from 10-10:25 each night outside our pension. We prepare light crackers and jam or some other snack and have mate cocido every night. (mate cocido is kinda like herbal tea). So yeah, we just chill outside and light up an incense and then just sip our mate cocido and talk about life and the mission and just whatever we want. It's so dorky that it’s fun. And it's such a change of pace that it has increased my mental health by like 300%. 

Con amor,

Elder Nixon

I didn't take too many pics this week. So here's two pics from tea time (one with and the other without flash :)) and the other pic is of the sunrise this morning which is nowhere near as good as Utah sunsets but is still pretty dang dope I think!!

October 16, 2017

Assassin

Well today is the day of transfers. I killed Elder Bareiro (means I sent him home to his house if you're not familiar with missionary terminology) and received my new companion. His name is Elder Gagnon and I'm super excited to be comps with him. He's from Tennessee and here’s the fun part- I'm going to kill him too, meaning he will finish his mission with me in 6 weeks. To have a trainee kill both of their trainers is almost unheard of, so we will see how it goes!

The language is coming along a lot better. I think I made a lot of progress with it this week but I'm not sure how having an American companion is going to affect all that now. As hard as it was to have a Latino comp at the very beginning, it forced me to use Spanish a ton and as a result I improved a lot faster so I'm going to have to be really disciplined this transfer to keep up the same rate of progress!

Honestly not much happened this week. I guess the most noteworthy thing would be because everyone knew Elder Bareiro was going home, they all wanted to feed us so we ate like kings this week. We had an asado (expensive argentine bbq) almost every day this last week. To give you some perspective, most missionaries have 1 or 2 asados per transfer and I think I had close to 8 or 9. So yeah to say I've put on some weight this transfer would be a fair statement. 

I'm not sure what more to put. I had more blood sausage this week. The first time I tried it, it was raw and not that bad, but this time it was cooked and as a result bled everywhere and my plate and definitely was not my favorite thing, but I choked it down to avoid offending anyone. So yeah that stunk. 

Dang all I can think to write about today is food and it’s probably cuz I'm starving so I'm gonna go find food. Love you all!!!!

Con amor,

Elder Nixon

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL BABY!!!

pics of me and Elder Bareiro leaving our pension, me with an asado y our last district meeting!!

October 9, 2017

Hola everybody! I hope you all had a great week and are enjoying your fall weather and all the changing leaves because it is heating up south of the equator. I have no idea how hot it actually is because everything here is in the metric unit, but it's really humid too. My companion tells me I haven't seen anything yet too, so come December when you're all in the snow, I'll be a puddle in the calle. 

I think the best day this week was probably Tuesday. We started the day with a district meeting which went really good! Then our Zone leaders dropped by for the day to go on divisions with me and Elder Bareiro. I went out with Elder Xavier. He's a Brazilian and is absolutely insane. He's super funny and energetic but can be super serious and spiritual when he needs to be. He's a stud and it was way fun to spend the day with him especially cuz he bought me a giant ice cream cone :) Anyways, during divisions we walked past a man and women drinking mate and smoking outside their house as is the custom here. As we walked past, we both felt like we should turn around and talk to them. At first, they kinda made fun of us and were really suspicious. Elder Xavier handled it so well though and they really opened up. When the conversation turned to how young we are, I took the opportunity to jump in. I told them about how the reason I'm in Argentina at only 18 years old is because I love God and know He has revealed his truth to the earth again and that we can find answers in the Book of Mormon. The spirit was really strong and the next thing I knew they let us in and we started teaching them. The first thing Rosana (the woman) did was tell us why she wanted to talk more. She told us about how her dad died and all she believed in know was death and suffering. You could tell she was pretty bitter to God and even had a Grim Reaper necklace on. Well, she wanted to know why her dad had to suffer so much. We started teaching the Plan of Salvation like clockwork and used so many scriptures in the Book of Mormon. We left them with the book and are going to return tomorrow to talk more. It was an awesome mission experience though. We didn't plan to teach the Plan of Salvation that day, but we each had so many scriptures and the right words to say come to mind when we needed them. It was awesome!

We had a baptism in Carcarana this week! Her name is Candela and she's one of the investigators of the other Elders in our district. So it wasn't my first baptism but it was still super powerful and the spirit was really strong. President Allred even came which surprised all of us. The service was super good and it reminded me why I'm here. It all went so perfectly minus the cake I tried to bake for it.....I won't tell you what happened to that.

The other noteworthy thing this week was our trip to Rosario for interviews. It went really good and I love President Allred so much. He was behind schedule, yet still made me feel like he had all the time in the world to help me. After interviews we went to McDonalds. It's nothing like it is in America. It's kinda the same taste but way better. Also they have like 25 employees behind the counter making the food and they just blast their music and have a grand old time. It's kind of the social hub of Rosario actually. Definitely not like the dumps in the states! So yeah that was fun to get a Big Mac in Argentina :)

Sorry this email is so long but we did a lot this week and it was definitely a good one! To close, I'd like to request all your prayers that Argentina qualifies for the World Cup cuz they might not and if the one time in my life I live in a culture that loves soccer, they don't play in the world cup, I might cry.

Con amor

Elder Nixon

The first picture is all 6 Elders in our pension having a lunch we cooked. The second is what happens anytime an Elder falls asleep on the bus-it must be documented. The last one is a pic from the baptism this week!!!

October 2, 2017

I ate blood :)

Well, to everyone concerned about my ability to understand conference- a miracle happened. I did not receive the gift of tongues, but I did receive splits with another American in my district and a computer lab to stream in English. So yeah, I was able to watch in English as we pigged out on Alfojores and I was a happy missionary because of it. My favorite talk was President Nelson's. I told you all a few weeks ago but I'll repeat it here. The Book of Mormon is VITAL to conversion. If you wanna be happier and closer to the Savior, the Book of Mormon is the way to do it. 

       This was probably my favorite week so far. I don't know what happened, but something finally clicked inside me and even though understanding is still in the coming, I don't feel so stressed and Carcarana just is my home right now. I'm not afraid to talk to people anymore and Spanish is coming along so much faster. It's going really good right now. I still have mountains to climb in the language, but I can finally see the summit and it's motivated me like I haven't been before. That and my comp got sick on Wednesday, so I had a whole day to study and rest again so that definitely helped as well!!

       We have another tentative baptism coming up this month. His name is Angel, he's 14 and he's a stud. Lots of the guys here are so into drugs and alcohol they don't know what to do with life. He wants more for his future and I'm pretty sure he has recognized he can find that in the gospel of Jesus Christ so that has been a definite high point teaching him this week. I'm really hopeful about his progress. 

       Well let’s finish with some more fun facts about life in Argentina. The value of the Peso is a joke here. To illustrate that, let me tell you about what happens when you don't have the exact change. They give you little candies, no questions asked. It's just how it is. So yeah, they use candy for change. Food is super oily here also. A regular meal consists of lots of noodles and pastas and some sort of small portion of chicken. On good days, we get beef, and on incredible days we get ASADO. It's basically Argentine barbeque but is so good. I had my first time with it this week and I'm in love. I also tried BLOOD SAUSAGE this week which is exactly what it sounds like and it really wasn't half bad!!! 

Love you all!!!

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!!!!

Con amor,

Elder Nixon 

Here are the pics for the week. This one is our District (me, Elder Bareiro, Elder Mallet  and Elder Argyle) prepping for one of our many service projects. This one is when we put concrete on a ceiling and it all fell off and was a monumental waste of time!!! :)

This one is Elder Argyle and I watching conference in our own room in comfy chairs while everyone else sat on a hard wooden pew.

September 25, 2017

My first baptism...kind of

Well for all of you who told me how cold it is in Utah this week, I want you to remember for me it is now Spring, not Fall, and the days are not yet really hot, but I can really feel the humidity starting to build. It's no bueno. By the time Christmas comes around and you all are freezing, I'll probably be a melted popsicle on the sidewalk so that'll be fun!!!

       

       This was another interesting week. I don't know how else to describe it. I'm teaching this chica named Talia and she has a sister who invited us to their baby's baptism this last Sunday. We definitely didn't feel good about going to a Catholic baby baptism, but they insisted we come to the lunch after so persistently that we caved. To say we took some persecution would be an understatement, but the chicken we ate was unreal so if I could go back, I think I would do it again. Still think it was kinda dumb but oh well!! We live and learn as missionaries I guess!! So now in the future I know, if it’s a Catholic event and you show up as a Mormon missionary, people will make fun of you. 

       I'm pretty jealous of all of you who will be able to listen to the General Conference in a language you understand. That will not be a privilege I will enjoy so please take full advantage of it for me!! We spend lots of time teaching about the importance of prophets out here so please please, please watch it with an open heart and be willing to take the advice our prophets give us from God!

       I thought it would be fun to write about some of the fun cultural things that have been interesting to discover. First off is the bidet. Not sure how to spell that but pretty much they don't use toilet paper here. They have a separate throne in each bathroom whose sole purpose is to give your bum a bath each time you defecate. So yeah that's been a fun change I guess. Also, to greet people here, they kiss on the cheek. All the members know not to kiss the missionaries, but every now and then when we're contacting they don't know we aren't supposed to and they just go for it. I think I've been kissed more as a missionary than I was as a high schooler :) My companion laughed his head off the first time it happened. There's dogs all over in the street but not the gross mutts in some foreign places. They're all relatively clean and all have homes and they can be a nuisance but whatever. Uh que mas? I dunno I'll write more another week!!!

Love you all so much!!!

Con amor,

Elder Nixon

Tucker's cake he made 

No toilet paper in Argentina...only bidet's

Here are some pictures I found off Tucker's mission blog of his first day in Argentina.

Meeting his companion, Elder Bareiro, for the first time

Tucker with President and Sister Allred

September 18, 2017

The madness and the Book

Well this week was actual madness. I went on splits Wednesday in the city and ended up in the house of some guy named Leo. As usual, I couldn't understand a thing and we taught our lesson but this guy was nuts. I don't think he was completely sober personally, then the one thing I understood was Elder Curtis asking him if he's ever killed someone and he said yes and that he went to prison for 6 months! What?? Then last night we were at a dinner appointment with a less active and he wanted to show us his hacking skills and he did some pretty dang shady stuff on the web, not gonna lie. So yeah, we meet interesting people for sure. Oh yeah, to add to the madness (and controversy) my companion who doesn't speak English loves English Christmas music so when you all start arguing in November if it's appropriate to listen to, remember I've been listening to it since September! Also I went to the hospital this week so that was madness as well. I had a bit of a fever and I told my companion who called the mission nurse who insisted I go to the hospital. He was convinced I was dying, even though I felt decent and prescribed me two days of bed rest. So that's always interesting for an eager missionary. On the bright side, I am well studied and rested now!

Our focus this week was on our 14-year-old investigator, Tomas. Before this week, he didn't believe in God but now he does and came to church and has a baptismal date for this month so hopefully that all goes well!

The last thing I wanted to include was how much people have been emphasizing the Book of Mormon in my life lately. It has literally been the name of the game for me. It's all we talked about in the MTC and all we talked about in zone meeting this week and is how we are instructed to contact everyone. It is true! Remember last April that President Monson asked us to read it every day!! PLEASE DO THAT!! FOR ME :)  I know the Book of Mormon is true and will change lives!!! 

LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!!!! PRAY FOR MY SPANISH! ;p

Con Amor

Elder Nixon

One of our investigators, the sketchy hacker, is a welder so here's a pic of that

Our district

September 11, 2017

Cuando no puede entender nada

Well that problem of having nothing to write about in the MTC is definitely gone. Now I have the problem of what to include and where to start!

Well, to start at the beginning, I arrived at my mission home on Tuesday. We were met by President and Sister Allred and a big platter of Empanadas. So yeah, right off the bat the food has been incredible and I'm very thankful that members feed us all the time because it is nigh impossible to find food in our pension (what we call our apartments). There's lots of pastas and breads and everything is really oily and delicious. Anyways, we spent the night there, had some training, then went to meet our first companion and head to our first area!

So this is where things get interesting. My companions name is Elder Bareiro. He's from Paraguay and is super nice and helpful and I love him. He actually goes home after this transfer so he knows what he's doing too! Here's the kicker though.....

 HE DOESN'T SPEAK ENGLISH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So yeah, I dare you to try and imagine what I go through every day! I literally can't talk with anyone! (effectively). To say learning to communicate with him was hard is an understatement, but we can basically do it now! Also, speaking of understanding, I can't do it! lol people talk to me and it goes clean over my head. They have a real thick accent here so the words sound nothing like I learned and I only know the words I need to teach the gospel lessons so yeah, I definitely don't understand much that's going on around me. I just kind of smile and focus really hard, trying to pick up phrases I understand. So yeah, it's completely Spanish for me! Even writing this email in English felt weird at first!

Well this is gonna get a bit longer than normal but y'all can deal with it or just stop reading I guess! To get around the city we walk. We walk A LOT! I think I have probably walked close to 15 miles this week no joke. Probably 3-4 miles a day.  The streets are dirty and all my stuff is getting broken in real quick. K I'm out of time. Look for pics and know I love you all and will send more info about my life here next week. Just know that although I can't understand, I love the adventure I am on and that I'm serving God and I am so happy here!!!

Con amor,

Elder Nixon

Elder Nixon in his awesome apron!

Elder Nixon doing laundry by hand

Elder Nixon and Elder Bareiro

ESTOY AQUI

Holá familía! I am here in the mission home! It was a crazy trip but here I am and I´m ready to go to work. Just wanted to let you all know I am safe and will write on Monday and I love you all so much!!! You are all in my prayers and LES AMO MUCHO!!!!!!

Con amor

Elder Nixon

Elder Nixon and Elder Fugal

Boarding the plane to Argentina

September 2, 2017

Well this is it folks!!! I head out to Argentina Monday morning and hopefully Wednesday will be in my first area and be out serving the Lord and the people of Rosario Argentina!! So yeah, hopefully the days of having nothing to write about will be long gone! The MTC has been a joy, but part of me is ready to say good riddance!

So this week was actually pretty entertaining! We only had classes up until Thursday so all those days were really dry but Friday was pretty neat. We had an infield orientation which is pretty much where we take an entire day to cover all the things we need to know for a mission but haven't yet. It's a lot of stuff like working with the ward and finding people and contacting and whatnot. One of my favorite things we did was a role play where we pretended to be missionaries and the other missionary pretended to be a member. OK this is gonna get confusing so pay close attention. We're both missionaries, but one is pretending to be a member. Then within that role play, we role played helping members talk to friends about the gospel. Does this make sense? Pretty much it was role play inception. I was pretending to be a missionary who was pretending to be a member's friend and it was pretty trippy. Just like the movie, we often lost track of what role play we were in!

The other thing I've realized this week was my standards of entertainment have hit rock bottom. There is some youth theme music on LDS.org that I literally jam out to when I can. Before mission, it was just nice music that I would sometimes listen to on Sundays, but now I think it's genuinely the best thing I've ever heard! Like I wanna get up and dance to it even. And all it is is soft Christian rock. We also had the staff of the MTC put on a play of what to expect the first week in the mission field. It was horribly corny and had terrible puns and before the mission, I would have thought it was so dumb, but now I just sat and laughed so hard and thought it was the funniest thing in the planet. So, standards for entertainment are pretty much in the pits. So if you have any awful jokes, send ‘em to me and in all honestly I'll probably find them funny!

THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART TO READ IF YOU GAVE UP EARLIER :) So like I said the next time I write, I'm gonna be in Argentina and be completely legit finally. I thought the last thing I'd put into my MTC emails would be my testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ because it's the reason I'm doing all this after all! I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the Lord's kingdom and that true joy in this life is found through obedience to the principles and commandments given to us by God. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and I love that book with all my heart. I have read it and I know it is of God. I know that Joseph Smith was a propeht and that he brought us the restoration. I know that happiness is found in serving others. Sé que esta iglesia es el reino de Dios y la amo con todo de mi corazon!!!!!

I love you all and would appreciate your prayers as I enter the next chapter of my journey!!!!

Con Amor,

Elder Nixon

The first pic is me, Joff and Park all together at once! I love seeing my old friends here! The second pic if you look close, we all have ties around our necks or in our hands. This is our tie trade night. All the dudes in our zone come out with the ties we don't want anymore and we just barter around and try to stay entertained. It's pretty dang fun! The last picture is one of our district in front of one of the coolest murals here with one of our teacher!