June 17, 2013 Formosa Argentina

I wish i could have been there for Fathers day! I really missed you. Everybody's father here seemed to be totally wasted yesterday and i had a headache from lack of sleep and yeah it was a hard day but a good one, i just wish i could have given you a hug. What did the family do for  you for fathers day i hope they made you milanesas! i made ñoquis the other day at a members house and i am gonna send you a super cool thing to roll the noquis into shape because it was super cool. yeah i haven´t decided how i am gonna send stuff and not get anything stolen but there are some things that i want you all to see. yep people "chch" here but it sounds a little different and most of the time i try really hard to ignore it because it is usually men trying to get the attention of my companion. yep we definitely have a snake problem. and a dog problem for that matter, i literally ripped my slip when i jumped over a canal to get away from a German Shepard. like it actually looked like a pure bred German Shepard and he was huge! like the neighbor let him out when we walked by and my companion was fumbling with her bag to hit it but i just ran and jumped the canal next to the road. yep it was scary but we are alright and we had another dog from the same barrio that was a great dane, greyhound mix that almost got me but i jumped back when it lunged at my legs and then the owner got a hold of it, but this time my companion took off screaming "fuera". it was so funny! yea and terrifying. oh today i woke up at 4:30 to go to Resistencia and then Corrientes to get my Argentinian id thingy. i am one step closer to being legal here for my whole mission. which is funny because my companion has been here illegally for 2 months now. <oh we had two investigators at church!!!!!! finally! i was so happy i about cried! and i am pretty positive that we might have my first baptism Saturday. oh i hope it happens! Oh i set a goal today to take more pictures because i am not gonna lie i don´t bring my camera much because i never have time to take pictures and we are told to only bring it pday, but i really should document some things so i will do that! we had a zone conference last week and all the hermanas sang. i am so glad that is over, and we found out that we have 71 hermanas that are waiting to come to our mission soooo i am scared because i think i will be training right after i get trained which is scary but i think i can do it...in like a few months. Hey dad i hope you know how much i love you. And of course tell everyone that i love them too but i was sad that i missed fathers day. i think of you all the time and i wish you were here to see my area and try the food and talk with people because it would be like the DR and going there really changed the way i looked at life........Words cannot express what you and the family mean to me. i love you soooo much! and i will do my best to take more photos! i am sorry i don´t have more time to write today but i was gone all day traveling and you were right, the buses here are really nice! i hope you have a great week and  don´t worry i have an awesome letter in Spanish headed your way, well i have to write it tonight, but i hope my Spanish will be understandable...tell everyone how much i love them!!!!! Thank you for all that you have done for me dad, time here is flying by and i am excited for the day when i get to give you a gigantic hug again! love you!

Hermana Quick

June 10, 2013 Formosa, Argentina

Hey! I am so excited to get your letters! So today has been kinda crazy and i only have a limited amount of time to email...well that's normal but it is near the end of pday. So today we went to the center of Formosa and went to a Paraguayan market. it was super cool! but in the morning we also cleaned our apartment hardcore! it feels so much nicer to be in our apartment now that it is cleaner. oh! i sent my letters to you today. I am sorry i didn't write more, i wish i could just send you my journal but i would be way to scared that it would never get to you. oh so i am gonna send this now and then send my mission president a email and then continue, but how is Connelly doing? (Connelly just had his wisdom teeth removed)

Oh so i just had a milanesa on a sandwich, it was sooo good! oh and i am gonna send you a box of their flan mix here because it was so delicious. also i think i am gonna come back a porker! like for real, we had 2 meals in a row that were so huge i feel like i ate enough for a family of 12 like i wanted to throw up! and both of the ladies just kept putting food on the plate and the one was saying how she loves it when people eat a lot! yeah i
actually kinda dread lunch because eating feels like a chore! hey what did you do for mom's birthday?

Well like normal i have run out of time to email but this week was good, i learn more Spanish every day and people think i have been here longer than i have. i love you sooo much and i swear i will write more next time, but oh! i almost forgot! i know we said there would be stores here and there are but they literally do not have some of the things i need and i have been looking so could you send me a package? (She goes on about all these highly important things like taco seasoning, socks, pens, etc. Obviously things that are life and death) 

i love you so much! and I hope you are doing really well! Love you! Tell everyone at home that i pray for them everyday and i miss them and i hope they are doing great and well i am doing awesome! :) Love
you!

Hermana Quick

June 3, 2013 Formosa, Argentina

I am sorry for ranting last week. i knew the first week would be hard. Monday was just bad, but after a lot of prayers and reading my scriptures and the support of everyone around me i feel waaay better. I have been participating way more in lessons and that makes me feel so much better! if all else fails i just wanna testify and my companion has been helping a ton! like she is really supportive. 

I have no idea where i am living now, like we live on the edge of barrio venezuela in formosa. Our area is right off circumvalacion and yeah it is also near barrio la paz, but let me tell you the organization of this place is crazy! like seriously it makes no sense and having a map hasn´t helped because the addresses literally don´t
follow a system. my companion thankfully has an amazing sense of direction because i can´t seem to get a hold of the place, but i will. Oh, so my companion and I made goals to talk more Spanish and we do good sometimes, but it has been our goal to bring more members around and when they are there we have to speak Spanish so i like that even though it is really hard. oh and tomorrow i am actually going on exchanges and the hermana i will be with is a native so yay! oh my companion and i barely missed the mission´s standard of excellence
this week! we missed it because we didn´t have anyone at church which was super tough because we worked so hard and there was supposed to be 8 of them but they all bailed! yeah but after praying a lot and reading preach my gospel with my scriptures, i felt soooooo much better! i was also waking up sad because i was tired, but now after praying a lot i wake up excited and happy and that is just further evidence that our Heavenly Father always, always answers prayers! hey, i am gonna send this so you can reply :) i love you all soooooo much!
Hermana Quick

2nd email response

Yep cyber cafe it is, my keyboard is awful too. <oh i forgot to tell you we don´t have a post office in our area so next week i will send my letters and stuff, but i am told it takes a month to get stuff there and three weeks to receive stuff here. <but i was wondering if you could send me some stuff, like hydrocorizone creme or something because my mosquito bites have been swelling to abnormal sizes yeah the people here were like whoa! you are allergic and i was like yep it seems so. and also more spray and deodorant, i have some
now but my companion said that they only have spray here and that it doesn´t work very well. also... <oh so i forgot to mention i ate milanesas the other day as well as polenta and you said you didn´t like that but so far i have liked it, we never eat vegetables though, i miss my veggies. oh and we ate canolees? i am not sure how to spell it but it was like crepes but with other stuff in the middle. yeah the food has been really good and today my  companion and i are headed to chango mas which is like the walmart of here and so that is how we are spending our pday. well also that is out of our area so we have that whole travel thing, oh but we can´t play sports here, like we can´t meet up with other missionaries on pday which is alright i guess, i like my companion so its cool. <i will get my address to you in my letter that i will write today with some more details. <i love you so much and i don´t think i told you but iguasu falls isn´t in my mission any more. i am in the other part and so you need to come pick me up so we can go see it at the end, and see your mission. i might just be dreaming, but the other day i was thinking about it and yeah you should come pick me up from here when I'm done. :) I thought i should tell you that now so you can prepare for that :) i love you soooo much! you are always in my prayers! talk to you next week!

May 27, 2013 Formosa, Argentina

Hey I made it!!! The rest of my travels here were good. I slept for 7 hours of my 10 hour flight, so that was really nice and then we waited in a church office building for nearly the whole rest of that day waiting for our next flight to Resistencia. I met an extremely atheist man there who was a professional squash player and the Brazilian Olympic volleyball team was on the same flight with us so that was really random. But we got to Resistencia and met our mission president at like 11pm and then we went to the mission home, which was really nice. We eventually slept. But the next day we had a little orientation thing and President Heyman and his wife are super cool! Well, I have only one companion now and she is from Connell Washington! She has only been here for 4 months and we were told that we were white washing an area so that has been an adventure! We just about know where everything is at now, well relatively. We almost got someone married our second day here but the guy wouldn´t go for it, which was sad because we could have had a baptism to start our area off but hopefully in 2 weeks we can do it. But yeah...castellano...so i understand a little, like most of the time I kinda know what's going on, but my companion isn´t fluent yet either. The other day a lady invited us in and while we were walking in my companion turned around and said, I have no idea what shes talking about...yep neither did I. So I have been trying not to worry about it because i am told that the gift of tongues will eventually kick in but i am having a hard time imagining that right now because i don´t feel like i speak Spanish that much at all. But our apartment isn´t too bad, the shower is a major pain! It is either super hot or freezing. Oh my first day we were so lost we couldn´t find our lunch appointment and we didn´t end up eating until 9pm..my companion felt really bad, but i just kinda thought it was funny :) The main meal of the day here is lunch and so far the food has been really good. oh and there are tons of dogs here! like they are all gross and they are everywhere! This sounds brutal but i kinda wish someone would just put some of them out of their misery because all they do now is get diseases, poop everywhere, and eat garbage!

 I love you so much and i am not gonna lie...this is really hard. like i have been having a hard time staying positive all the time, well it is actually only tough in the morning and evening, but i know i need this experience but sometimes i kinda want to cry... i know that god is looking out for me now, but i wanna be able to speak with the people around me!  i love you all sooo much! i know you pray for me and that makes things easier :)

Hermana Quick

A quick note by dad: I remember all too well those first few weeks of being immersed in a new culture with everyone speaking the wrong language. It is taxing on the brain to say the least and it makes everyone cry every once in a while as it is the most frustrating thing ever to not be able to speak or understand...but as I've told her, it comes with time and some effort. In a month, she'll be chatting up a storm and understanding most everything...something that took her dad a good six months to do on his mission in Uruguay back in the day! Any letters you can send always tend to brighten her day of course:)