Jordan's March 8, 2010 letter

March 8, 2010

Dear Family,

Hey there! I´m so happy for your letters - it sounds like it was a very good week! Even though there were some close moments, like when Carson almost missed his jazz festival! That´s cool that you were able to play so well- it shows that you really have lots of talents in music, and really you´ll be able to bless the lives of lots of people in your abilities in music. Even if you don´t want to do it as like a job, keep it up! It´s a great talent that you have, and it´s something that really blesses the lives of everyone around you, including our family. I´m glad you´re such a rocking bass player! Keep it up!

Thanks a million for sending me packages!!! I´m excited for them! My first two haven´t come yet, but I´m sure they´ll be coming either this week or the next - from what I hear, it´s usually like four weeks to get packages, so they should be coming soon! Yay! Thanks Mom and Dad! You guys are the coolest parents in the world, really!!!! I´m very excited :).

There´s some pretty sweet music here in Argentina - usually it´s stuff called Regatón, and I think it kind of stinks (because it´s like the Rap of Argentina and some other countries here too - maybe it´s all of South America), but the Tango and Salsa music, stuff like that, is awesome! It reminds me of working with Jay in the salsa band and learning with Ron in the world percussion class - it makes me want to play my congas. But for now I´ll just listen as I walk by and hit the congas when I get home!

No baptisms this week - we might be looking at a no-baptism transfer, which is a little bummer but we´re trying. One kid is named Luciano, and he´s a great kid and really getting ready for baptism, but he doesn´t have parental support. He really needs his parents at church (they are inactive, they´re actually his grandparents, they´ve started drinking and smoking, going to the Catholic or other churches at times, etc.). Yeah, it´s not the best situation with him. I talked with the Bishop about it and he said that this type of stuff has been going on a lot with them for years, and that the situation is that they´re offended at somebody or something in the church and that they don´t want to come back because of that. So what we´ll be doing with Luciano is teaching him still and bringing him to church, but we´re going to wait on the baptism so he can make the decision when he´s older, because right now if he got baptized he´d have the possibility of doing the same as what his grandparents are doing and that´d be bad. We´ll keep working with all of them to try and fix things up a bit.

The other two possibilities are Celeste and Daniel. Celeste is 18 years old and seems really good and interested, but her family is all Catholic and it´s kind of a problem. I called their house Saturday night to see if she was home and her mom answered me - she was really nice and told me to call in the morning because Celeste had left the house, so yeah I called in the morning and this time her grandma picked up. She told me nice and strong how they are Catholics and Catholic this and Catholic that, and that they (it really seems like "she") don´t want us to come in the house or anything. I told her that´s fine if they don´t want us in the home, and that we can visit outside and all is well. After that she just hung up. I was bummed after that, but we´re going to pass to see what Celeste has to say about it all. She´s 18 now so she doesn´t need parental approval to be baptized or receive the lessons, so we´ll see if she´s still interested or not. She had a baptismal date, but she didn´t come to church this week so we´ll have to push the date back a week if she still wants to do it.

Daniel is like a golden investigator from what we´ve seen - he is 15 years old, he loves the pamphlets and the Book of Mormon - he told us that they really help him feel better in his life and that he wants to be baptized. Woohoo! This is rocking, but he wasn´t able to come to church on Sunday because someone close to him died and he was at the funeral Sunday morning. So we´ll definitely keep passing by his house to see if we can keep him on the "path of righteousness" (as said in Emperor´s New Groove :).

One other is named Alma, and she is nine years old. Her mom is a member, so now we´re teaching her the lessons to see if she wants to get baptized. The dad, who doesn´t live with them, is Catholic, so we might be battling with that but for now things are looking really good, because we have some great member support in helping her make the decision. Yay!

Other than that, everything is pretty normal. I´m going around and getting people to sign my signature book, because in three weeks from today I´ll be in Ramos Mejía heading out to another area I think! So yeah, I´m doing lots of that too. Thanks for all your letters, love, and support! I love you very much and I´ll be writing another ginormous letter like this in a week!

Love,
Elder Nuttall