April 13 Weekly Letter

Hello family. Its good to hear things are going well. I feel like a lot has been changing as of late. Lindsey is getting married, and LINDSEY IS GETTING MARRIED! holy crud. My cuz is getting hitched to someone i dont even know! Que loco. I am very excited for her though. I am so excited to see her in arizona!

Este..... as for here in Argentina not too much NEW. Just my companion and area. The work of the lord just keeps going on. I learned this week that the work of the lord will always move forward. The invitation the lord gives us is that we participate and dont get left behind. Its helped me here late in the 9th inning. In the 4th quarter. Standing on the 18th tee box. Tired. I feel pressure of having to go back to real life. But i know that if i just finish strong and trust the lord. EVERYTHING will be ok. 

ME and Da Silva have been real busy here. We have i believe 5 baptisms this transfer. All they have to do is get married and ya está. Its amazing how much is focused on marriage and the family. It has to be for something. BUt i am really enjoying the time here in 5 saltos. I will expain howm y week went.

Monday night we had a great noche de hogar. Tuesday we cleaned the pension just about all day. I literally could not even think it was so dirty! NASTY. I got way into cleaning and i cleaned from after studies until 6 pm. thats like 8 hours straight. We got the pension in shape finally and now were able to feel the spirit there and work better. ON wednesday we went out to one of the neighborhoods in our area. Its about 45 minutes walk. Everything is real seprated. BUt it was great.

We did service for a less active family. They were doing construccion on their house. We helped pour concrete in a column....it makes no sense and its terribly done but oh well. They build houses terribly here. its sad. After the service we had a obra misional reunion. It was ok. But that was our day,.

Thursday we played basketball at the church. We got up at 6 am and ran to the church and played with a crazy member who has tatooed face and eyebrows and dragons and what not. He is nuts. But were heloing him and his friend who came is non memebrs o were working with that. But htat was fun.

Later that day we ate with a member and played his guitar a little bit and just had a good lunch. Then we helped the sister s move their pension. They are closing a lot of areas becasue the mission is shrinking. We had 250 at one point and now were dropping slowly to the goal of 16-180 missionaries. ANyways, it  was a good day.

Friday We got up again at 6 and.....bueno. Quickly i will explain the goegraphy of our zone. We have cinco saltos. its a small city. 4 missionaries including us are here. Centenario is 20 minutes up the high way. there are 8 missionaries there. Catriel is an hour and a half away. 4 mor missionaries. And 25 de mayo is 3 hours north, 4 more missionaries. SO. we got up early to travel to 25 de mayo to be in the district meeting. It was great. We halped the other elders area a ton and traveling is really fun on the double decker buses. We really had a good time and found al ot of new people to teach with them.

Ok. Saturday we had a good morning in our area and the n took a quick colectivo to centenario for the district meeting there. It was ok. After the meeting we waited at the bus stop for almost 3 hours. We got back to our area and had 2 amazing lessons and that was our day. We talked about mosiah 5 and it was just really great experience with this guy whos son was just baptized, NIko. HE also recieved the Priesthood. He is 14. And so his dad is planning on getting married then baptized. So excited. 

Sunday was ok. Really boring, my comp was sick so we had to sit in the pension a little but its ok :) I am reading hte doctrine and cvenants and am very excited to get to the later chapters that are very deep studies. 

Love you all unti lnext week!

Elder Westensee

p.s. estoy comiendo como chancho! :p ganando poco cada dia

April 6 Weekly Letter

Hello Friends and Family! I hope you all had a great week! I love you all!

 

This week was pretty good. I finished my time in Roca and have been transferred to  a place called 5 Saltos. Its about 45 miutes from Neuquen in another direction. I have been here for 1 hour. I like it so far. My copanion is Elder Da Silva from the office. I already know him really wellso i think ir will be a very fun transfer and we have some good stuff going here. I do miss Roca though.

 

I am very tired. Extremely exhausted. I got 1 hour of sleep in the last 2 days. I had to pack after getting home late from buying tickets for transfers. After i finished i layed down at 3 am and slept until 3 30. Then we went to the terminal and dropped off some tickets and stuff. We went back to the pension around 5 am. Slept until 6 am. Then I got up and went to Neuquen. IN Neuquen I found my companion and we took a taxi to 5 saltos. We ate lunch in Neuquen at Burger King! So goood.

 

Thats been my day. I got to my apartment and its really cool but really dirty and gross. Honestly i am so tired i am trying to clean it little by little but its like dirty dishes from months ago and gross everywhere so thats my plan this week is to whip the pension into shape.

 

As far as my last week in Roca.....It was good. We had a few fun exchanges and the icing on the cake was general conference. It was a very uplifting experience for me and i truly learned so much from it! I had to say goodbye to some great members and some good missionary friends but oh well life goes on. I am so tired and just trying to finish strong but its soooo hard. I am burned out haha

 

I pray every day to keep going strong and just try to get through and be effective and do the lords will. But wow. I have so much to say but just no time here and not much energy to write haha im sorry. 

 

 I will fill you ina lot more on the details in a few weeks! Love you all!

 

Elder Westensee

March 30th- Weekly Letter

Hey everyone. I am sorry for the lack of writing and stories but i have had no time and i still today have little time. Its a sacrifice sometimes but vale la pena. (its worth it) Also i want to say that i love you all and i think about you a lot. Thanks for the emails capos!

This week was a special one for me. WHY? because i dont know if you remember my investigador who we found and had an addiction to cocain and meriajuana (terribly spelled) and had many problems with the law of chastity in his life having 4 kids bafore he was 22 and yeah.....very very comlicated. But the difference was that we saw his potential. We fasted for him on many occasions. IN the process, he fell again into drugs. But through the atonement he was ablt to get help and make his life better. After many talks and phonealls with president, 4 long months of headaches and questions and trials, I am proud to say that Jonathan was baptized and confirmed this weekend over in cinco saltos. (remember he moved a few weeks before his baptism) But i have never witnessed such a miracle honestly. Gos has showed me on more than one occasion very plainly that he lives. He has shown me that there are no limits when we do his will and when we keep our covenants. And more than anything he has show me his love that he his for me. 

What an amazing experience. I cant explain in words how grateful i am to have these experiences. I dont feel likei deserve it. Its a blessing so big to be here learning and to progress that i dont even know how to describe it. 

When i think about life in a deep sentido, i come down to the question of why i am here and why i have life every day. And i realize that i am here to serve God. Nothing else. And part of the plan is that in the process of serving God, we will be shaped and prepared for eternal life. Im not just talking about the mission. We are here to prepare the world from the second coming and most importantly prepare ourselves with our families. When the second coming happens, all theings of the world will not be worth anything, So I invite you all to start now and start making eternal investments and keep the big picture in your heads always!

As far as my health I am doing better. It was 2 months of suffereing and weight loss and fever and throwing up and etc. But what a blessing it is to have the priesthood and to have a blessing that after the blessing i was better in a week! Again, i tell you that God lives and he loves us. I cant even tell you how real the priesthood is. I have seen so many miracles here that have changed my life!

I love you all and will let you know where i get transfered to next week to d¿finish the last 6 weeks of this great mission!

Have a great week!

Elder Westensee

Weekly Letter March 23rd

hey everyone. This week was pretty great. Not too much new. I am getting tired and worn out but still kicking. The zone is very blessed as we are really acheiving our goals and baptizing a lot... SO much fun really. 

This week i was able to do intercambios with My MTC companion Elder Ogden. We loved every minute of the exchange and taught some great lessons together. We are helping a guy stop drinking. He said he is 90 percent ready to be baptized. He has stopped drinking completely but now we think he might be mentally crazy. Its too bad. But well see how Lito progresses this coming week. 

As far as my health i am still a rail but eating at least. My number one goal when i get home is get healthy and stronger and fatter. ..... and take care of myself. I havent been doing a great job of that stressing about mission items and sacrifing a lot when i probably should take better care of myself. But i can hanbdle it and we are seeing some amazing blessings. 

I have no time im sorry. I got to go! I will write more next week 

Elder Westensee

Weekly Letter March 16th

Hello Friends and family. This week was a great week! Like all of them! I only have 9 weeks left so get ready! Right around the corner! Anyways im glad to hear everyone is doing good. what a relief for Tasha! So good to hear that! I miss you all very much and am very excited to be home and see you all! 

Not too much is new here. I WAS keyword WAS sick for a month mas o menos with parásitos. or parasites. It was a nasty illness  that ate me alive. I lost a lot of weight and had no energy but now i am better and eating like a gorilla. So hopefull in these 9 weeks i can convert into a fatty.

This week was solid. It was very hot. And humid. we ahd a lot of work. Same old same old in our area. We are working with a ton of people. 

We had interviews with president on thursday. My interview was 100% about my health. Basically I need to gain weight :) But that was it. We had a great week as a zone and we are working very hard to get baptisms. 

Not too much else is going on......things are getting pretty old in this area its the exact same thing. My companion eats a ton and is geting fatter by the minute. But he is really cool and funny. 

Later today were goin to play soccer............este......i dont know what to say. 

I love you all. oh ok I can share something from the week. I have been studying a ton about temples. Its super legit. I would invite you all to study more about the temples. There is a lot to it and it is very cool! DyC is huge in the study pof the temple. Im very excited to go to the temple!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LOve you all have a great week. Thanks for your prayers i have felt a huge difference this week! Miracles still exist in the earht today!!!

Elder Westensee

March 9th Weekly Letter

Hello everyone I am sorry I have very little time. Lots of people emailed me this week and i feel guilty if i dont respond so i have been running through all the emails. I lvoe it though. Keep writing me haha.

long story short. I am sad to hear tasha was sick :( I hope you feel better. I hope all goes well we need to stay healthy!!!!!!!!! If you dont have your health you dont have anything! I am sick as well ;( 

This week was a special week for me. I learned a lot about faith and miracles. I have been deepening my knowledge about temples still. I am just building up suspense for when i go to the temple hahah! its coool. But anyways. The week went like this.

We went to the leadership meeting in neuquen on tuesday well, monday night at 12 pm. The meeting was not like any other. President Lovell said we had 0 baptismal dates for the end of the weeek. He got a little upset with us as leaders. 0 Fechas for the whole mission!!!!!! So we decided to really work hard and have a fast so we could baptize some people. In the end we baptized 8 people in the end of the week. Normal is 7 baptisms. In the week before, we baptized 28 people as a mission. Thats high for this mission. We are seeing so many miracles. 

Not too much else is going on. We have some exciting things going on. 

On friday we had our Zone training. It turned out de diez. Everyone enjoyed it and really we are excited as a zone!

Not too much else is happening. i lvoe you all very much!

I have been a little sick! I have a parasite. Its gross. I have been losing weight rapidly and unable to eat much of anything. Its too bad. I will keep you updated! Not too bad though. Just hope I can pass it this week and start gaining a little bit. 

Love you all. Take care!

Elder Westensee

March 2nd Weekly Letter with Pictures

Hello everyone. Sounds like theres been some good storms in utah. Its been an oven where i am at and it stinks. (literally) the sewers in the street leak out and it stinks bad. And its hot. But its all good! 

This week was unbelievably busy. To start off my new companion is here i already told you about him. He is cool and tranquilo. Asks a lot of questions and eats a ton but he is cool. 

I have been studying a lot about hte temple. I miss it so much holy junk. Its really hard not having a temple for 2 years. The temple is so deep we have no idea. Long story short i am so excited to get married haha. The temple is my biggest goal and to figure out hte misteries of the kingdom through prayer, study and the holy ghost and through temples we can achieve some of htese answers. Pretty cool the temples!!!!!! I am so excited. Also to get some more garments that are new :)

We have worked hard this week and have seen lotsd of fruits! We had 6 baptisms this week in our zone! Pretty amazing! Things in our zone are really high on all levels. Muchas Bendiciones!

Jonathan, our investigador who had an addiction to cocaine moved to centenario cinco saltos about an hour away!!!!!!!!! NOOOO! He called me to tell me he wanted to still get baptized over in 5 saltos and that he wants me to baptize him. I said we would have to see if president lets me. So i hope i will be balt ot be there for my good buddy Jonathan and see him get rid of all his cargas at his baptism. He really is sucha capo and I have never seen such a big change in a person than i n Jonathan in my whole life! He is the best, 

On Friday, we went to Cervantes to do 4 baptismal interviews. Cervantes is a small town 40 minutes outside of roca in bus. Theres like 2 members in cervantes. But we went out and had the interviews and they all passed and were baptized on sunday after church due to meeting on saturday. It was a great week but very exhausting.

Oh we found a 17 year old girl who is a friend of the familia rivera here in roca. we showed up and she was over just hanging out. We then shared a little about the plan of salvation and she liked it as she has a father who passed away and has had a lot of trouble in life. She loves the message and said she felt the hair on her arms stand up the spirit was so strong. We showed her the video HE IS THE GIFT. if you havent seen it, go watch it this week it will pick you up spiritually.

I was a little sick s well all week i think from something i ate but im not sure!

I lvoe you all. not too much else is going on. Oh! My companion is a professional soccer player from Chile. HE played for the UNiversity of Chile. Its club very well known and high level of play. Im excited to jagr la pelota hoy!!!!

I will send some pictures!

ELder Westensee

p.s. Tyler, i am so pumped to hang out like old times haha I want to get ripped again i am so skinny

February 16th Weekly Letter

Hey evryone just want you to know i love you all and miss you all like crazy! I d ont havem uch time. I am healthy and doing well. The work is a little tough right now. Its tough as we just got a new bishop. The old one  cheated on his wife becasue his wife cheated on him first, anyways its a messy situation and hard to work when everyone is less active because of that. 

Its hard being a zone leader because everyone looks to us for decisions and counsel. But its fun and i am learning a lot and am able to use my experience in the mission to apply to my leadership role so its not too hard but its stressful for sure. I will be speaking sunday for the 3rd time here in Roca. I am going to talk about unity of the barrio. 

Not too much has happened. We have seen tons of mircales. We give people card with our number on them. 2 people called us this week and are now investigadors. Our investigador jonathan overdosed on cocaine this wekk :( we have been visiting him in the hospital. He is totally fine but is in the mental health place. He put himself in there because he wants to change. He is lost but were trying to help. In the hosptial we got invited by a nurse lady to go see a boy who went crazy. This is hte 2nd time i have seen someone......crazy....or posessed i dont know what to call it. But he was tied down to the hospital bed....really crazy. He started talking to us and laughing like a craszy manand saying how he was the most powerful man in the world and stuff. I learned that we shouldnt talk to them like that or egg it on. So we just went in and ignored hte shinananigans and said like hey man we hope you feel better and well see ya later haha. We thought about giving him a blessing but we ended up not feeling likei t was ok to do so. 

ANother funny thing is that the last time we went to visit jonathan, he had a roomate who was a prisoner. He was handcuffed to the bed. He had an IV in and was getting surgery later in the day. But there wasa a cop with him as well. But he got up to go take tests or somehting in a nother room and the cop helped him up and then went to put hte handcuffs on hiom again and before he cuffed him he was examining his arm liike......hmmm. ¨where do i put it¨ im sure he was thinking because he had an UV in his arm. After a few funny seconds he just puts it right in his arm haha and the guy is like ÖUCH!¨ haha kinda weird stuff this week.

Well i love you all. I will be getting a new companion in a week! Have a greatt week! If your not already doing it set a goal to finish the book of mormon! That is hte key to getting to know christ better!

Elder Westensee

February 9th Weekly Letter with Picture

Hello Everyone! Sorry about last week! I had ZERO time to write and now i just have a tiny window to write. 

This week was half fun and half boring i would say. On monday we had P day de zone and we cooked tacos and played soccer in the pouring rain! Goit soaked! But it was fun all around! Later that night we had an excellent noche de hogar with a less active family and finally, using inspired questions, we uncovered some doubts. We found out this family dousnt even have testimonies, they stright up told us they arent sure if the plan of salvation is true. But we invited them to read and pray about it and they accepted and are truly wanting to know so well see :) But still we had visited them so much before and finally we cracked opoen the egg ;) Now lests hope the father gets baptized and they get reactivated and then we can make some scrambled eggs with that cracked egg haha

ok ok lets see. Tuesday we had a service project and right after we finished digging a trench around some plants to water them, it started dumping rain on us. JUst absolutley like a shower. We ran home about 15 minutes through the river in the street almost swimming. It was flooding very very bad. But we got home and slid down our apartment complex hallway like a slip and slide, i will show you videos someday. But it was fun we made the best out of it. But then  right after, we showered to go to NEUQUEN for the consejo de lideres. We left at 10 30 and eveything was just flooded so we couldnt catch a taxi for so long! But like dads story we said a prayer right there on the street and out of nowhere comes a taxi. And we made it on time :D pretty cool the power of p´rayer. We got stopped and had to get off the bus in Cipolletti for an hour at 1 am and there, we talked to every single person waiting there with us and other people walking around the terminal. It was fun. Then we got into neuquen at about 2 at my old pension with elder Cardenas and Moser. We talked until about 4 am.... It sucked the next morning in cinsejo at 8 am. We had long meetings until 4 pm. It was a great meeting thoughand theres some new stuff we need to focus on. 

On thursday, we slept a little bit to recover from the treachurous viaje to neuquen all night. So that day was pretty tranquilo. Not too much else happened, we planned out meeting for friday.

Friday, we had our zone training. This was my 2nd time in charge of the meeting wiht my comp. I think it went pretty well. We had great lessons abouthte book of mormon. We played a game where you ask a random question about life or the gospel andyou have to use the book of mormon to respond. It was way fun. I got the question "what happens to my dog? because my dog died! where is my dog now?" I wqas just like what the crud, but i got a scrip´ture that helps understand it better. ALso in the meeting, we played minute to win it. But all this i will explain after, much easier. Easier to explain in person as well :) 

Saturday, we worked from 3- 9 30 straight without eating dinner which we never weat dinner, but it sucked iweas way tired. We didnt see much success either. But we saw miracles that is for sure.

Sunday was good. Normal meetings and normal stuff. Nothing new.......I am getting tired. Its been really hot here as well. 

I am going to send some pictures now!

Love you all!

Elder Westensee

January 26th Weekly Letter in Spanish

Hey family! LOved all the emails. Hearing about hte cabin and how fun that was made me feel super good and also made me want to work HARDER. Bacause if i work hard i will have no regrets after and be able disfrutar aun mas estar en la casa. Pero FA esta semana era re loca. ME canse escribir en ingles porque hay una liña roja abajo las palabras porque la compu es en español. Pero bueno.

OK hold on, i loved the pics of tayson and lilly and park and brook, and everything i always melt looking at those pictures i love them! :) 

No hay mucho tiempo así que les cuento rapidito. Vimos un montón de milagros esta semana. Estamos trabajando a full. Hemos podido encontrar nuevos personas enseñar. Uno en particular se llama Jonathan. Este chico ha tenido una vida re loca. pero igual, estamos para ayudar y el quiere cambiar de verdad. Recibimos un mensaje el martes justo cuando estábamos en la calle buscando personas. El mensaje dijo que hay un chico que vive en nuestra área se llama jonathan que intentó a matar a si mismo. Pero sobrevivió y ahora quiere cambiar. Está profundamente en drogas y tenia problemas familiares.....Pero ahora està a full leyendo el libro de mormón y todo. Que loco!

Iba discursar este domingo pero no quedó tiempo. Igual 3 misioneros hablaron de la obra misional. Era buenísima.

Jueves tuvimos la conferencia de zona con Villa regina y Roca. 2 zonas. Era buena pero hacia mucho calor y todos morimos de calor. Pero bueno, no hay mucho mas contar. Les amo un monton y agradezco a cada uno de ustedes por todo lo que hacen para me. Que tanga una buena semana!

Elder Westensee

January 19th Weekly Letter

Hello Everyone! How are ya`ll. Hope your all just loving life. Too bad Oregon blew it again. Sounds liek they had such a good team. They are always just right on the edge of winning it all. Andrew and Tasha are Spurs fans???? Thats gross. Anyways. Its good to hear baby Tayson is doing good :) I cant wait to meet him! Along with Dustins Baby!

As for me its been going very well. Very busy. My last companion is the new asistant now and I am with Elder Furlanich one of my good friends here. 

Sunday Night-- Elder Lubomirsky stayed with me in the pension. He is from argentina and a good friend as he was my last zone leader. But now he is a district leader. BUt we dropped off Elder Yañez at the terminal at 10 pmto go to neuquen. Then we went home and ate dinner and went to bed pretty late. 

Monday-- We woke up at 4 am to go to the terminal and help those missionaries who were leaving to be off. Everyone was there on time and it was great. But hte collectivo was 2 hours late. So it got here at 6 30 am. Then they told us there is no room for any bags. The missionaries who were getting transfered had 3 big bags each. So we figured we would go on a KOKO bus, or a smaller more normal bus to bring the bags to neuquen. So we did that. I went with elder Lubomirsky and Elder valenzuela with 7 huge bags in a bus for 2 hours to neuquen. We got there at about 9 30 am. I felt so tired and sick from the rough bus ride. It was soooo hot too. But then we went into the termainl and gave hte bags and just hung out for a bit as we felt sick and couldnt ride the bus back to Roca just yet. So we took a taxi to Jumbo and ate some subway. I saw a lot of friends in the mission becasue everyone is always in the neuquen termainl for transfers as neuquen is like hte centro of it all. But then after Subway we caught a bus back to Roca and went to send the datos for the week. Then we had a little free time at5pm before my companion arrived so we took a nap in the cool chapel. It was great until an hermana came in and was like hola???? And i woke up like.....i hope she doesnt see us haha but after the nap, we went to the terminal and right when we got there, my companion arrived. We brougth him back to the pension and just talked until bedtime. We made a sweet dinner and played some trucho. It was good.

Tuesday- We Went to a ciber in the morning to let Elder Furlanich write his family because he had no chance before to do so because of transfers. After, we made a lunch and then went out to visit some people. A guy named Fernando called me. I met him a week ago in ciber and he told me he wanted to learn english for his petroleo job. So he came tothe church and took us to his house. He rolled up at the church in a black pimped out PT cruiser haha and was blairing music. Kind of funny. We taught him english he knows a good amount, then we went later to a menos activa family. The familia Tura. They are great. We were supposed to eat dinner but they forgot. We ended up almost being late to he pension. 

Wednesday-- In the morning we had service. Clearing weeds. My allergies have been the worst. So bad. It sucks. a lot. Then we went back to he pension about 12 and made some lunch. ravioles. It was really good. Then studied a bit. We all showered and then went over to Roca 2 for elder lubomirsky. He was still with us waiting to to go neuquen for his new companion who he will be training. Then we were at his pension for a little bit we helped him clean and what not. Then we walked back. It was a long long walk to we had no time to do anything in our area. 

Thursday- In the morning we dropped Lubomirsky off at the terminal and did exchanges with the cervantes elderes. I went with elder Rodriguez. He is a new district leader so I helped him understand what  to do and stuff. We talked all day to people and found some great new investigators. Lots of people are related as Roca is a small town. Like hockinson i feel like just all mushed close together. ANd the houses are trash for hte most part. (no disrespect) But it was a great exchange and we had a lot of fun!

Friday- We went to the terminal to greet the new missionaries who are coming to Roca. They are cool. 2 elders and an hermana! Capos all of tem. After we went to a district meeting. Then we ate lunch at the pension and studied. Then we went out to wrok and visited some awesome people. 

Wow theres no time left gonna have to go quick now. Long story short:

This week we found a family of 4 who wants to be baptized! 

iN A LESSON THIS GUY  told me he got stabbed in the nalga. I was like....este.....cool. Then he stood up and pulled down his pants and showed me his butt! Pretty gross right! 

We were just walking on the street and some lady stops us and says elders! We went over and the lady said her son was missing......so we put the flyer she gave us in the church. The next day walking she stopped su again and asked for a blessing. We went into her house to find 4 new investigators who got to witness the blessing and feel the spirit. These 4 are different from the family of 4. But they dont live in our area so we will pass the miracle to the sisters. I was able to give the blessing what a cool experience it always is. 

Were seeing some awesome miracles here in Roca. The more we consecrate ourselves, the more miracles we have seen. 

Well talk next week!

Elder Westensee

January 5th Weekly Letter

Hello everyone. Once again i am an uncle!!! So great to hear that Tayson is here with us on this beautiful earth! Im glad everything went smoothly! I am excited to meet him! 

This week was outstanding and very busy. 

Monday- We had our P day. We went liek normal in hte morning to write the family. After, we did compras at Carrefour like normal, the supermarket. Its normally like 500 pesos for foo every week. And thats just eating hot dogs and noodles....but then we walked to the church to play some hoops a little. Some lady started yelling at us for throwing a frisbee in the church on the court. She is like ARE YOU CRAZY its 2 30 pm i am trying to sleep! All of us gringos just laughed so hard. This lady called the stake president but nothing happened. I hate the customs here. It is a very lazy people. But then we kept playing. I saw a kid walking on the street wearing basketabll shoes and a lebron shirt. i invited him to come play. He came and played. He got swatted like 5 times but he wasnt too bad. I got his info and we now have him as our investigfator he is soooo ciool. His name is Lautaro! We played for a few hours then went to the pension. We left to work at 6 like normal. We had a service activity with a big guy who cant walk very  well named cheeto. We cleaned his yard and maoved bricks, etc.  I saw the biggest tarantulas of my whole life. There are beast spiders here. But then we finished a few hours of service and went back to the pension to plan. that was the day.

Tuesday- Quiet day. We went to a district meeting in Roca 2 in the morning and then after for lunch we went to buy 1000 pesos of meat for the asado we were going to have with the zone on new years. Every missionary payed 50 pesos. After that, we went back to the pension and ate lunch. This week we never ate with memebrs as the economy sucks and no one has money. and lots of people are on vacation. But we found a few new investigators and a menos activo boy named marcos. He is 15 yrs old. He is cool. We challenged him to read the book of mormon. He accepted and seemed really excited.

Wednesday- We Went to ciber (computers) in the morning to send the enfermera (nurse) an email about my companions back. He is going to neuquen this week for a doctors appointment. Then we ate noodles and ketchup for lunch. me da asco eso ;p but my companion loves it haha We went to visit a menos activo family and then at 6 we went to enjoy new years with a member called Leo.He is cool. He served in the california mission...dont rememebr which one. But he also lived in the USA for 5 years so he knows english very well. We just hung out with him for new years and talked about cualquier cosa for 3 hours. That was that. We went back to the pension and they were shooting off tons of fireqorks near us so we couldnt sleep at all until 4 am.  we went to bed at like 11 i think. 

Thursday- We got up at 8:30!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! thats what pres told us we could do. Then we went to the church at 9 to prepare the asado. It turned out great, we played soccer, and frisbee all day. I got sunburnt pretty crispy. It was a good time. After we showered we went out to visit some of our investigators. 

Friday- The asistants came and did exchanged with us. It was fun. We did some work. Nothing highlights really out of the exchange just that by the ed of the day i was beat. We ate lunch at a chines buffet which was ok. We all satyed there for a little so full we couldnt move haha

Saturday- We had an asado with a member, Cheeto. I think he sent you guys a picture on facebook. Check it out. But it was good ,then we went otthe church to have a baptism. My comp baptized the little 9 year old girl. It was a awesome. Then we went and planned for our busy week coming up.

Sunday- Tranquilo. We had 71 poeple at churhc. very low number. last week we had 99. Were focusing on re activating a ton of people because the church here is honestly sad to see. Its not growing by any means so we are focusing on truly strengthening the church, not just getting numbers and baptisms that go less active in a matter of weeks. 

Thats about it. I am tired as junk. EVERYONE tells me 2 things. 1. That i look like a friend or cousin that they have. and 2. That i look very very tired. Thats the life! haha 

Things are going great. Just cruising out here in the patagonia! Happy New years love you all!

Elder Westensee 

December 29th with Pictures

Hey everyone is was great to skype with you all! I have literally nothing to say because we just talked. But i Sent a few pictures so you can see a little of what i have been up to.

It has been very busy and the work is progressing in our ward! Our weekly asistencia is rising as we keep working with the memebrs and less actives. 

We got a new bishop this week as well. We were without a bishop before so now we will be able to organize everything so much better and do the work in a more efficient way! 

This week we will have an asado at the church as a zone for new years and play sports all day until 6 pm. It will be a fubn activity! I love you all and am soory i didnt write much! Have a great week! Hit me with any questions! I Wish you all the best! Stay safe in this holiday season!

Elder Westensee

December 18th Weekly Letter

Hello everyone. Good to hear your all doing great. SOunds like life just keeps going on. Not too much new to say this week. 

Since getting to Roca its been quite a trip. Had an allergic reaction pretty serious along with all the other big changes in where i live and what i do as a missionary. Im glad to be out of the office and able to talk to people more in the streets and get to know memebrs more closely. 

Thats my favorite thing about Roca. The people. They are so legit. The members i have met. about 4 families are incredible. So much fun and such capos with very strong testimonies. The true success in the church around the world is the testimony of every member. So its great to be a part of this ward and get to work with such awesome people. One lady i met who is less active was really cool. Her name is hermana Crespo. She is 30 years old and has 3 kids and is divorced. But she is a professional boxer and works for the swat team in villa regina here close to Roca. She is soooo coool. She went ot mexico to compete for the womens world title in boxing. But she has a great testimony just has hit a rough patch. We will help her on her way back to the church. But she is just a cool person it was fun to visit her. I could talk about hte people here for a long time.

This week we have been focusing on our activity coming up on the 20th of december. We are going to the dowtown centro and singing in a choir christmas hymns. Our whole zone. We have 26 missionaries in the zone. While we are singing there will be about 15-20 members walking around passing out little sweet breads in plastic bags with a card of the church that says he is the gift. They are cards we were given for this month to pass to everyone. So we are very excited about that and hope to see a huge surge in references and from the results a few baptisms in the future. So thats where were at right now. Very excited as here in Roca they have never seen anything like that. 

Not too much else is going on. Im back to a pension where i have to fill a bucket up and stir my clothes to wash them it stinks. pero que va hacer. Also in our pension there are tarantulas all over hte place. HUGE spiders. I have killed 3 in just this week. The biggest one i have seen was out on the street it was as big as my hand literally. ..... ooohhhhh it gives me the heebies. BUt ihave some wicked pictures and stuff. But yeah thats been fun to watch out for in the pension.

As far as investogators go we have few right now so this week we will focus on finding. We have 2 baptisms scheduled still but thats it for now. 

Back to the pension. We have some weights in the pension and i have been working out pretty hard in the mornings. I am getting a littel back of what i lost ;)) That makes me happy for sure. But its hard to stay awake during hte day working out hard. But its worth it for sure ...

Not too much else going on. I had a hard time transitionaing and the trials will just keep coming. I have learned a lot every day out here and am grateful for my struggles. Mistakes show us what we need to learn. If we never try, we will never know. I have been thinking a lot about what the prophet said recently about how our decisions determine our destiny. So i just think about my goals in the future about persuing education, getting married in the temple, having a family, etc. And i think about what can i do to better prepare for that? I just think being the best missionary i can right now is all i can do so thats what i will continue to keepo working on. To be more obedient, to be happier and more positive, and to learn to turn to god when i am alone and find comfort from that source. 

The gospel is a beatiful thing and i know i will be blessed for opening my mouth to share the good news to everyone. Its scary still sometimes and not comfortable but just read isaiah 55;8-9 and it becomes easier to understand. For me at least. BUt i lvoe you all, the church is true, share the gospel with your friends this week! Do something to help the missionaries. This work is more important than anything else. 

Have a great week i will send some pictures!

Elder Westensee

December 8th Weekly Letter

Hello friends and family! Its good to hear from everyone. I miss you all very much and hope you have a great week. 

As you all know i am now out of hte office. After 5 transfers, 7.5 months, i am now sitting in a cyber to write haha. Que raro! It feels weird being here i feel rushed again! I dont like it. But i am now in Roca, about 45 minutes from neuquen. Its hotter in Roca and more dry. And not much out here. BUT the work is really great in roca. Our zone is destroying right now. Hopefully we can continue seeing these miracles. 

This week was the weirdest, best, worst week of my mission i think. It started off saying bye to the sisters in my group and many other good friends. Very fun days to spend with them butthen when theyall left i just felt so empty and weird. Like im out of the looop kind of. But anyways i satyed in the office a few extra days to help elder cardenas my old comp get situated as financiero. He will do great. Then on thursday at about 3 pm i went to Roca in a collectivo by myself. It was a crappy bus, like a street bus, not a travel bus and its called KOKO. I had my 2 huge bags and backpack and sleeping bag and it was just weird....I was in my suit as well just sweating like crazy. I was alone for the hour and a half ride. On the way i just felt so weird....i started tearing up a little on the bus i just felt soooo alone i dont know how to explain it. I pulled out some pictures to look at on the way as well. But wow i fell asleep after a while on the bus. I woke up and we were in a town called allen. I had no idea what was going on but eventually we got to Roca and i got off that nasty  bus. Took out my 2 bags and everything and went and found my companion with 2 other missionaries waiting in the bus terminal. 

From there we went to the pension. It was soooo hot. BUt anyways the pension was so nasty. i started to unpack a little but ended up cleaning a lot. I took off my shirt cause i was burning of heat. Then i saw a rash on my bicep....i was like....what the heck.....then i took my garment off. I was covered in a rash. my comp and i laughed for a while until it got really bad then it was like oh fetch. Being my stupid self i said, lets go work. I went out to work after the rash died down a little bit. IN our lesson, i started breaking out again all over my arms and a little on my face. Thats when we went to the hospital. They got me in in about an hour as i sat there itching my legs, arms, back, chest, etc. (luckily i avoided an uglier spot to have a rash) But finally i got in and they gave me an injection of i dont knwo what. It helped for a litle bit. Then they gave me pills. These past few days, its been off and on. But turns out i had hives, or an allergic reaction. scary! my throat was closing up last night as well and the night before but now i think iam better! I hope! 

ANyways i got to go! Love you all have a great week! Miss you all! 

Elder Westensee

November 29th Weekly Letter with Pictures

Hey everyone. I am gonna be short today im out of time sorry. I loved reading all your emails. Your all so great. I am glad nobody got hurt this turkey bowl haha always seems like someone get hurt. But I miss you all and will be with you next thansgiving :) 

This week, i got my transfer. I am out. I am going to Roca as a leader. I am excited because my companion will be elder Yañez from Chile, the financiero before me and Elder Real. He is great and funny. He knows english almost perfectly. So it will be fun to have some english conversations again. 

Not too much else is happening. I am basically wrapping up this area visiting old friends and people who never progressed and just giving them my last word and testimony. Hopefully they can one day accept the gospel. Above all i am just sad that Carlos didnt make it to church or decide to change his life. He really would be so happy if he just would live the gospel. Oh well. We have our agency. But yeah not too much else as far the work goes. I always to talk to a bunch of people but just forget the details. Ummm....JOse, we found him he is an old investigator he was just leaving his apartment so we walked with him and he said he wants to get baptized now. He said he is ready. So im excited for my companion to be able to have that. Such a blessing. BUt yeah i am leaving this area a lot of good stuff i am pretty happy. Well see how my new area goes. :)))) its about 45 minutes away. 

So remember when i said i had to get rid of the guitar? Well i talked to president a while back and he said i can have it still and what not but that i need to play hymns and not waste time. I agreed. But still i am choosing to put hte guitar in the attic of the mission where it has been the last few weeks. But anyways i was walking with my comp in my area nad we found a guy whos got a guitar shop. Its small and kind of messy but cool. He wanted to buy my guitar. So i am going to sell it to him. BUT i saw an old black guitar in his shop without any strings and equipo. But it caught my eye. So i am going to do this: Trade my guitar for hte black one, as he will fix it for me. I have to pay extra because its a nicer guitar but its worth it. But now i will have this black guitar when i come home. I want to take it home as a souveneir from argentina. Its cool. But im not 100 percent yet if i actually will take it home. Anyways thats that for hte guitar.

I have been very sickthis week. Woke up monday with minor sore throat. Tuesday night i woke up at 2 pm with massive ear ache and acute pain that i was almost about ready to call hermana lovell. But then i said a prayer and saw a great miracle. Pretty cool experience. I will tell you one day about this experience. Anyways, I haventhad much of a voice, i cant hear out my left ear and my head has been hurting. I am doing better now and am taking antibiotics. NO worries but it sucked for a few days. 

Not too much else......im writing nonstop really fast i got to go soono. 

 Sounds like my sweet blazers are doing well. :)) That makes me happy. But yeah. have a great week everyone!!!

Elder Westensee

November 22nd Weekly Letter

Hello friends and family, 

I am still in the office as of right now. Its been 7 months of learning and work. But its been great as well and a lot of fun. As i write this president and the asistants are right behind the wall of my office working on transfers. Well see where i go. I am almost certain i am gone. Its about time right?. 

Its great to hear from you all seriously. I would love to get some pictures from everyone. JUst of everyday life whatver. it doesnt have to be special. But just to see everyone im forgetting! Its nuts about berries for sure! I love reading your emails and its exciting the changes that are going on. 

This week was just another week out here. We had our zone meeting on thursday and the theme was ¨the reason for our hope¨ a talk by elder packer. It was solid. I got to share a talk and stuff it was tranquilo. But I also got to talk about the money of the mission a little and we raised the monthly money again. Its a lopng process and complicated but we will have more money now thank goodness its hard to survive these days the inflation is terrible. When i got here an alfajor was 5 pesos. Its now 13 pesos. Crazy right? milk as well has raised 30% in price just the past 6 months. It sucks here as far as that goes. 

Its always fun to have the zne meetings as i see old friends and its always uplifting. Not too much else happened this week.....

Last night we were asked to take a fridge freezer to Roca for some hermanas. We left at about 6 p.m. Went to my old pension to grab the fridge. Cleande it out and cleaned the pension a little bit. Then as weare leaving i hop in to drive and 3 of us 4 get in and my companion stays to lock the gate. After about a minute we look over and he is struggling to lock the gate. I yelled ¨hay que empujarlo al dentro para cerrar bien¨ turns out he put the key in wrong and got it stuck. So we waited around until the owner showed up about 20 minutes. Then we had to saw the key and take it a part and fixed it like that. But now we have no key.....anyways after, we went and were on our way to Roca. Roca is about 45 minutes drive. We got there great and all went well. We ate dinner with hte zone leaders in roca. Platano deep fried with tuna salad and crackers surprisingly good. Then we drove home and got home at about 12 pm. But it turned out well.

Nothing much more exciting has happened. 

I am ready to get out of hte office. I just would like to study again and be able to have more teaching opporutunities. But at hte same time i a mscared a little as its been a while since being in the schedule of normal missionary i forgot how it is.... But i am ready. Its like im starting over again at being in the field haha should be fun!

BUt thats about it. I dont know what to say. I will know my transfer next week and i will let you know where i go and who is my companion. 

Love you all thanks for your support. The church is true. Have a great week and try to share the gospel wioth your friends! Oh that reminds me. We are now teaching the members and doing practices with them on how to share the gospel. Its amazing and so much fun. We use preach my gospel to hewlp them know how to be misisonaries as members. We dont preach as members but we can testify. Its been way fun in that sense.

Im pumped to tear it up in the field again. 

Love you all!

Chao!

Elder Westensee

November 8th Weekly Letter with Pictures

hey everyone. Its been a good week. JUst keep grinding and working and seeing miracles. Im loving it so much. I feel very blessed to be here and to be able to serve. Sure, im skinny as crud and i would love to eat tons more food and drink protein and lift, but i just realized that this work is way more important than my skinny-ness. haha. I will be able to lift again someday. But yeah i was thinking like, wow, my emails have gotten super boring. Im sorry for that. I will try to spice it up a little more ;)

This week was radical. We had lots of crazy things happen. Not really. BUt kind of. Monday we had an outstanding lesson woth carlos. He loves the guitar and the hymns of the church but doesnt really have a testimony. We left 3 nephi 11 for him to read. HE READ IT. He read 12 as well. 2 chapters. We asked what he like about it and he shared 2 verses that touched his heart. WOW: when he said he read and shared that with us it was a moment where we just sit there surprised with our mouthes open and speechless. I felt like a spotlight was shinging onto Carlos in the dimly lit room as he spoke and there were angels singing ¨halelujah¨ halelujah! But then after we just explained to him what he felt. He said he went to kneel down after reading to ask if it was all true and his friends came to his house and burst open the door. He didnt end up praying. But he had a great experience. Also, he and his friends looked up why it was called the book of mormon haha. He said it all perfect and i as surprised. He is an eternal investigator but we are seeing real changes now. Its exciting. 

Other than that we get rejected a lot. But its not like a NO GO AWAY! its just like people are not keepibng commitments. Like they are nice but just say nah its not for me. Im just like.....how is not for you! Your crazy! Were not here to teach you only were here to help you remember the truth. Thats what i always think. Theres nothing worse than to know someone is rejecting the word of god. Its sad. This isnt a matter of life, this is a matter of eternal life. Some people just choose to avoid it because sometimes the truth is overwhelming. And Satan wants us to think its impossible and that there really is no eternal life. This life is meant for enjoying, thats why we have hte gospel. 

Not too much else has happened. I got to see some good friends this week from the consejo we had. I love my friends in the mission. I have met a ton of new people. Its great. Being in the office i now know almost every misisonary personally. Its awesome. Elder Furlanich came and stayed in my pension for the night. He got in at about 10 and we talked until about 4 in the morning. I couldnt sleep i dont what happened. but i still feel the effects of that. But we had a deep study all night haha about the temple and experiences weve had and stuff. And the relationship that some chapters in the book of mormon have with the bible and ven doctrine and covenants Super powerful. I loved it. It spiritually recharged me as i dont have too much time to study these days in the office. But i can just tell you the more i learn the more i know this church is true. Its hard to find words to explain how much i really believe this.  

Things are busy and stressful in the office. Theres always some sort of problem to fix. And sometimes theres no answer to we have to get creative and make it work. But im learning a ton. I love it. 

I was reading in Alma 26:35 i think it was. I think this is my favorite stripture. I know i have like 50 at least but dang this is a good verse. We are nothing without god. The more we realize this and understand it the more humble we will be. We will be more willing to dothe will of god and not what we want. In return of doing this god has prepared to give us all that he has. Is there aything better than that? I dont htink so. 

I love you all very much and cant wait to give you all a big hug. But for now were just going to keep working out here! 

Elder Westensee

November 1st Weekly Letter

Wow. This week absolutley blew by. What happened. I dont even remember. We worked a lot in the office. Finished up the rent and asignacion adn debts of missionaries and lots of things. President was out of town all week so i could go to the bank. He went to a conference in Brazil at a waterfall place for mission presidents pretty cool. 

Not much is new our investigators are stagnant right now. Making up dumb excuses and being lazy. But  i know carlos will come around soon. 

We did nt work much this week in our area gracias a algunas cosas pero mas que nada el trabajo en la oficina. I have been dead. 

Oh i remember now. I have been praying for more opporutunities to do service. We havent done service hardly at all. In fact my last service activity was in NQN Oeste 1 year ago when we built the house. This week we got our moneys worth with service! I was super pumped. We went and painted the inside ceiling of a familys house. It took 3 days and a total of about 15 hours of service to finish and were still not completely done but it was so much fun. We stained the wood i guess its called. A dark mahogany. Looked nice. A very nice house i must say but we had a lot of fun between me elder cardenas castillo and da silva painting and messing around and just enjoying some good service and hard work. They gave us dinner every night after we finished for the day.

ANother thing that happened this week was that the old lady who comes in the office and helps with stuff punched me in the face and my companion in the back of the head. Your probably thinking.....hmmmm. what? But yeah it happened. We didnt do anything wrong she just got mad and thoguht we locked her out of hte office and came storming in and kicked our door open and punched us haha. Nothing too grave but super funny. The lady is seriously crazxy in the head. I feel bad for her as she cant control herself so were trying not to tell many people about what happened. It wasnt just me and my comp but one of the asistants was there as well so its wasnt too bad. But man i am just still trying to believe it. 

I have been thinking this week a lot about all the blessing i have recieved and really just how grateful i am for everything. Family, friends, gospel, opporutunities, etc. I will always be in debt to my father in heaven and my savior. And so with thaty in my mind what can i possibly do if i will always be in debt? I can do what he asks of me. He doesnt expect us to be perfect. Were going to mess up a lot. But if we repent and keep going and doing our absolute best we will be happier and enjoy the blessings of the gospel and achieve our potential. The church is true. i love the gospel. I love every one of you and hope you can also enjoy the gospel every single day and see the blessings in your lives!!!

Love yall have a great week!

Elder Westensee