Word of the week: "hablar" (to talk) and "escuchar" (to listen/hear)

Well, I don't have too much time to write this week, but here are the highlights!

Monday (San Luis)-- Last P-day in San Luis. We napped, caught up in our journals, cleaned, emailed and ended the day with the transfer call. I knew where i was going, so it was rather ant-iclimatic!

Tuesday (San Luis)---we spent the whole day cleaning and packing to move the hermanas to the elders area so the elder could move into our area. (the stake president in San Luis wanted to switch where the elders and hermanas worked, so we do as we are told). The elders did a good job cleaning their apartment, but lets to honest, they are still 19 year old boys, 21 years old at best. we spent the night unpacking (and cleaning some more) and saying goodbyes

Wednesday (TRANSFERS)--- we woke up really early to go to the bus terminal, then my bus was about 45 minutes late. i ended up waiting in the terminal by myself for about 45 minutes because everyone else was going else where. it was weird being alone, but nice having some time to think alone. When I got to San Rafael, we unpacked for a little while, then had lunch with some members (yummy empanadas and tomatoes stuffed with brown rice and onions!).

Thursday-Sunday---We spent the week passing by less active members and references from the other hermanas who had worked in the area.

San Rafael is very beautiful with tree lined streets, flowers outside people's homes, and lots of tourists. It wouldn't be Argentina without lots of dogs and buses, but this city is very clean and very Western inspired. There are tons of vineyards here and olive producing factories (ie Farms). I really love it here, though the work is very different from San Luis. I'm still working on figuring out how to apply what I've learned thus far in my mission to this new area. My companion is Hermana Garcia from El Salvador. She is a very hard worker and is helping me lots with my Spanish. We work a lot with less active members here because the ward is small in terms of attendance numbers, but the ward list is really long.

we have taught some great people already though. we taught a family of 9 (including the parents) and few days ago and visited with the mom on Saturday afternoon. We talked to her and were able to work on some of her doubts (knowing that our church has the Priesthood authority, that the Priesthood we have is truly the power from God, that God answers her prayers). At the end of the lesson, we knelt down to pray. She wanted us to say the prayer, but I felt really strongly that she needed to offer it. After spending 20 minutes talking about the power of prayer and knowing that if we were asking her to pray to get an answer to her questions, she needs to start praying now...with us. She said no when I asked her to offer the prayer, but I persisted, telling her we were there to help her. She kept kinda shrugging...I asked her why she didn't want to pray and she just said she didn't know what to say. She had been telling us that she wasn't sure Heavenly Father listened to her, she wanted to know why she and her family work so hard and barely scrape by while other do nothing and have money coming out their ears. She got really quiet, head bowed, arms folded tight...and started to pray. I have never heard such a sincere, powerful prayer. She said what was in her heart and expressed very frankly her concerns and her desires to know. It was so POWERFUL! She finished, and wiping tears from her eyes, we left her. My companion told me later than she never had prayed with the missionaries until then. Pray really is so powerful, something so simple, but brings mighty blessing into our lives.

There are lots of people here who have heard the lessons of the missionaries (and they have the pamphlets to prove it. they always bring out the pamphlets when we start teaching and show us that they've kept them...it's really wonderful actually!). This week will be great to see what it's really like here in San Rafael.

Thanks for the love and prayers. It's much appreciated and I've really felt your combined strength this week.

Un Besito! (Argentine cheek kisses)

Hermana Pelton