Hola,

Today is July 29, 2012 and it is the last day of calm before everything starts to happen around the Buenos Aires Temple being rededicated on September 9, 2012.  Between now and then the Area will have a training for the guides that will be helping people tour the temple (starts today), holding a press conference for the press, hosting VIPs, and holding the actual open house for members, vecinos, friends, investigators from the 4th of August through the 25th of August.  Then there will be a big cultural celebration on the 8th of September and Elder Eyring will dedicate the temple on the 9th of September in 3 different special sessions.

Last month Elders Foster and Aidukaitis left for reassignment to Church Headquarters in Salt Lake City and this month Elders Zeballos and Vinas arrived.  Elder Zeballos is from Chile and will be the first counselor and Elder Vinas is the second counselor and is from Spain/Uruguay.  All is good.

Cecilia Leaves

Maria Cecilia Tavares, our dear friend and secretary in the presidency office left the office this last week.  We were sad to see her go but she is young and has big education plans in the future and so she will take some time to prepare for exams and to get her paperwork completed to enter BYU in the fall of 2013 in order to receive a master degree in psycology.  We will miss her very much.  Here are a couple of fotos of Cecilia and us.

Mike and Judy with Cecilia

Cecilia and La Hermana Bigelow Together

Maria Mayer

Today Judy and I visit Sister Maria Mayer who is now in a public hospital near our apartment.  She is in her 80s and is experiencing severe kidney problems.  The hospital we visited is not anything like St Petes or the Capital Medical Center so we should not complain about our facilities.  Sister Mayer is in a large room assigned to one of 16 to 20 beds (I did not count) but there is no privacy.  There is a screen between a set of 2 beds so I guess there is a little privacy.  Anyway we gave her chocolate chip cookies and she made us promise to bring chocolate brownies next time.  Here is a picture of her and Judy.

Marie Mayer and Sister Bigelow at the Hospital Priovena

Estela y Jose Luis Ortholan

Last Sunday Judy and I were invited to almorzar (lunch) with Brother and Sister Ortholan in their apartment.  We loved it–empanadas de carne, sliced tomates, pork loins with salsa, puree to calabaza (squash), and lemon bars for dessert.  We enjoyed ourselves with these wonderful people.  They live in a small 2 bedroom apartment where they raised 5 kids and the word is that most weekends there was a good party going on in the house because Sister Ortholan is such a great cook.  Here is a picture of them and us.

Jose Luis, Estela, Judy, y Mike

Rosario

Knowing that the “storm” was coming and having permission from Elder Arnold to take a couple of days for a last little fling, Judy and I went north 3 hours to Rosario.  Rosario is a city of about 1.5 million people and is adjacent to the Parana River which empties into to the huge Rio de la Plata.  We stayed in the Holiday Inn Hotel in town and walked to several tourist locations along the river during our stay.  I would say that the most impressive thing we saw was the Monumento a la Bandera (Monument to the Flag).  Here is a picture.

Monumento a la Bandera in Rosario, Argentina

Here is a picture of the everlasting torch that is part of the monument.

The Everlasting Torch at the Monumento a la Bandera en Rosario, Argentina

Here is a picture of one of the fisherman trying to sell us a fish (Dorado to be exact).

Dorado and other fish at the fish market, Rosario, Argentina

And last but not least, Mike buying oranges and lemons along the freeway on the way home.

Mike buying oranges and lemons on the way home from Rosario, Argentina to Buenos Aires, Argentina

That is about it for now.  Our days are counting down so we are taking every opportunity to spend time with our friends down here.  They are wonderful people.  Be good and read your scriptures.  The Bigelows

All the sister missionaries on our way to the ice cream parlor for a farewell treat before Sharol left.

As winter is in full swing here in Buenos Aires, it’s hard to believe that all our North American friends are getting ready for barbecues, boating, swimming, and all sorts of outside activities.  We must admit we envy you a bit, but we’ll just have to settle for 9 de Julio, the Argentine independence day.  And yes indeed, it means another holiday.  I’m getting used to all these days off!

We feel like during this month of July we are also enjoying the calm before the storm.  The Presidency is gone and Mike is in charge until July 10th when one of the new counselors (Elder Zeballos) arrives, so that means he is pretty much tied to his desk.  Then, about the middle of the month we’ll take a couple of days and go for a little trip.  Haven’t quite decided where, but we feel like it will be good to have a break before everyone returns the end of the month.  The “storm” will begin as soon as President Arnold and his other new counselor (Elder Vinas) arrive.  I don’t mean that they are the storm, but rather that’s when the marathon of activity starts around here.  I have mentioned before about the rededication of the Temple here in Buenos Aires.  The open house will run the whole month of August, then on September 8, there will be a huge cultural celebration (program) held in a local soccer stadium.  The next day there will be 3 rededication sessions.  Months of preparation have gone into all of this and it should be quite spectacular.  Needless to say, the stress level around the office will be running very high during August and September.  In between all of the temple activities, in August,  there’s an Area 70’s meeting in Santiago, Chile.  Much time and effort is also needed to get things in order for that, plus the Area Presidency and Mike will be in Chile for the 2 days of meetings and 2 days of mission visits .  To top it off, in October there is an Area review and Mission Presidents Seminar with 2 General Authorities coming, for which planning is already taking place.  So we’ll just hang on and try to enjoy the ride!

The couple that is replacing us arrives the middle of August so the way we look at it, the timing is pretty good.  They will be able to help with some of the workload, learn how things are done in our office, and be ready to take over that last week of September.  Our actual departure date is September 27.  It’s coming very quickly, and I wouldn’t be telling the truth if I said we weren’t excited about returning to our family and home.  However, we are enjoying the journey and taking in every opportunity that presents itself here in the South America South Area.

I was informed, through the grapevine, that we haven’t been making many entries in our blog lately.  So I’m going to try to get caught up by putting in many different pictures of things that have been going on for the last month or so.  We have been so blessed with good friends, wonderful opportunities to serve, and excellent health (at least excellent, considering what we have to work with)!  We have felt many tender mercies in our lives and know we made the right decision when we chose to serve a full-time mission.  The Lord opened the path for us and has been there to guide us along the way.

The cute couple that owns and runs the lavadero where we take our sheets and towels to be washed and dried.

One last Sunday dinner at the Fosters. Rebecca, Marianne and Bill Wingo came too. It was a fun afternoon.

Hermana Anderson meeting her missionary son in the Area Office, after his 2 year mission. They flew out together and met his twin brother in Atlanta. All three flew home together. What a reunion!

The Fosters and Bigelow taking one more photo as they say their last goodbyes.

The spanish students with their maestra, Samanta, and secretary Cecilia. We were headed out to a farewell lunch for Sharol, even though she couldn’t go (they left a day earlier than planned). Renee, Cecilia, Sharol, Samanta, and Judy

Elder Arnold with Elder Aidukaitis and Luisa at the Farewell Devotional.

The Fosters with Elder Arnold at the Devotional

Elder Arnold presenting Patsy a silver tray at the devotional. She worked as the secretary for the Area President for 24 years. She more than earned that tray! She’s a real sweetheart.

Our little primary in the Belgrano Ward. I play the piano for them. Well actually the keyboard.

Sharing time in Primary

Check out those cones. They’re like a piece of artwork!

Sharol and I at the ice cream parlor.

The whole group finishing up our treats.

A quilt I made for one of the ladies in our ward that just had a baby. It started out as a Relief Society project, but never quite got off the ground. I really had fun working on it.

Here it is a Sunday evening the 3rd day of June 2012 already.  We are spending a pretty quiet day here in the apartment after a nice morning of church meetings.  In church, testimonios were given, a good sunday school lesson was had, and the ward leaders explained what we should do to take advantage of the Buenos Aires Temple being rededicated and reopened in September of this year.   Judy and I feel very blessed to have spent the last 14 months here in Buenos Aires as we have gained a better perspective of life by being part of the culture, city, and church here.  We have said many times how wonderful it will be to be home, but also that we will miss this missionary life in the great city of Buenos Aires.

Like all missionaries we have good days and weeks and not so good days and weeks but we try to keep a good attitude during the not so good days because we know that God looks over the work and will take care of us.

For those who have not lived in a big city, and we had not, it is a very different lifestyle living in an apartment without access to a personal garage and vehicle.  We have grown to like the city life we have and the access to so many things like parks, bookstores, shopping, colectivos or buses, subways, beautiful french designed buildings from the past century, multiple embassies located nearby (we discussed this earlier), the mild springs and autumns, the many good restaurants, and most of all the very hospitable people we have met that make us feel welcome.  We will miss this very different and charming way of life when we return to Olympia, Washington at the end of September.

BYU Women’s Volleyball Team

During the last 3 months I have been communicating with the head coach of the BYU Women’s Volleyball team because the team was coming to Buenos Aires as part of their team’s summer tour this year.  The coach served a mission here and wanted to have a service project and Sunday service and asked for help arranging this part of their tour.  I was able to connect with the right people and, sure enough, we were able to set up a couple of service projects for them, a volleyball clinic for young volleyball players, and a Sunday service at one of the local ward units.  Everything went great for them and I believe they enjoyed themselves.  Judy and I attended a couple of their VB matches and we had a good time too.  At one of the matches, many members of the Church were there to cheer them on against the champions of the Argentina junior league.

BYU Women’s Volleyball Team in Buenos Aires, Argentina with various members of the Church-May 2012

Temple Dedication

Recently, it was announced that the Buenos Aires Temple will be rededicated in September after being closed for more than 3 years for renovation.  Everyone is very excited and we are looking forward to the open house, cultural celebration, and the dedication itself on September 9th by President Henry Eyring.  He will be accompanied by Elders Ballard and Christoferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and Brother Walker of the Presidency of the 70.  It should be quite a wonderful time here and Judy and I are very fortunate that all this will happen before we leave at the end of September.  We will even be able to attend a session or two before we leave.

Missionary Games

Judy wanted to include the picture of me playing a game with other senior missionaries.  It is a simple game but fun.  To play the game, one needs MMs, a straw or two, bowl, and 2 dice.   The players suck on the straw so that the MM adhers to the lower end of the straw long enough to move the MM from the bowl to the table.  The player to the right of the straw sucker player, rolls the dice until a double comes up at which time the bowl of MMs and dice move to the left one player.  It is a game that truly tests your lung capacity.  Anyway, here is a picture of me playing the game.

Missionaries playing the MM Sucking Game

New Stakes in South America South Area

During the last month and in the next couple of months the area will be looking to create several new stakes.  Elder Arnold is in Uruguay this weekend to create the Treinta y Tres Stake and last Sunday we held a special priesthood meeting in La Plata Villa Elvira Stake to test the waters and determine if that stake is really ready to divide into two stakes.  There are several other stakes ready for division and districts qualified to become stakes.  This is a picture from the meeting.

La Plata Argentina Villa Elvira Stake special priesthood meeting on May 27, 2012.

New Senior Missionaries

Beginning this Tuesday we will begin receiving 4 new couple missionaries in the month of June.  This Tuesday Elder and Sister Hill (Elder Arnold’s sister) arrives as does Elder and Sister Zobell who will be replacing Sister Otonnelli as a counselor for the missionaries.  Next week the Ashtons arrive and later in the month the Switzers arrive.  By the way, Elder Switzer is a brother to our friend Cathy Bentley (small world, especially in the Church).

Judy with Samanta (her spanish teacher) and Cecilia Tavares at a “cooking school” at the Fosters

Hola Friends and Family,

I just looked through the record of our posts and discovered it’s been a year since we made our first entry here in Buenos Aires!  Where has the time gone?  As October

draws closer the days seem to be flying by!  As happy as we’ll be to be reunited with friends and family at home, we can see it’s going to be difficult to leave the dear friends we’ve made here in B.A.

We’ve been very busy this past month.  As usual, the day to day office work never stops and keeps Mike particularly busy, and my workload has also picked up.  With the addition of Chile to our area in the next 2 months, we’re sure we’ll see many more forms for leader changes and boundary changes come across our desks.  It should be very interesting.

Mike and I have both become much more involved in the ward and are really enjoying getting to know the members better.  We’ve also had a few opportunities to do a little actual missionary work, which is nice since we are “missionaries”!  As I mentioned earlier we’ve been asked to visit 5 less active families in the ward and it’s really been a blessing to go and visit them in their homes.  Today one of the families even attended the full 3 hour block of church.  We had gone to see them last Wednesday and ended up talking mainly with the wife.  Mike gave a short lesson on the sacrament and the importance of attending sacrament meeting.  We talked about why we need to partake of the sacrament each week and there was a very sweet spirit in the room.  When we saw the whole family walk into church today and sit in the row behind us, I knew Mike had been inspired with the lesson he chose to teach her.  It was the first time they all had attended church since we arrived.  We may not have had much to do with their coming today, but it still warmed our hearts to see them all there.

Looking out our window at another tormenta (storm)-
We were surely glad to be inside our cozy apartment!

Mike has also had the opportunity of going out with the young missionaries and assisting them in any way he can. I think he quite enjoys going with someone who can speak spanish so he doesn’t have to carry the whole conversation by himself!  We saw the fruits of one of their visits from a few weeks ago, when 2 of the children were baptized today.  The whole family was there to support them and it was a beautiful meeting.  As we walked home we commented on how nice it was to be able to participate in so many uplifting experiences.  We’re very blessed.

Tonight we were able to host another family home evening with the young single adults from our ward.    They are a wonderful group of young people and it’s great to have them in our home each month.

We’re including several pictures of things we’ve been doing and places we’ve visited in the last month.  It has been a very busy, but enjoyable 4 weeks.  We are feeling like this is home (for now).

We send our love,  Mike and Judy

Another trip to Kansas for Judy’s birthday dinner. She doesn’t look a day over 29!

Birthday dinner with special friends-Fosters, Kellers, Garvins and President Arnold (Devonna was in S.L.)

A trip to the famous Recoleta Cemetary with our good friends the Fosters

Mission Presidents’ Seminar- Montevideo, Uruguay-April 2012

A farewell dinner for the our friends the Zobrists who are now home in Las Vegas-
They will be missed-

Some of the Senior ladies with our sweet “mailman”, Juan, at the office –
We had just returned from a lunch for the “girls”.

The cute Gonzalez Family after a visit and lunch at their apartment

Our visit with Viviana last Wednesday.

Dinner with Omar and Eli Garcia at Kansas (The next best thing to a restaurant in the US.

Instead of a “For Sale” sign in the window, you put a plastic bottle on top of the car to let people know it’s for sale.

Here we are already at the beginning of April.  A year ago at this time we were headed down to Salt Lake City to begin our mission.  How the time has flown!  We’re certainly glad we don’t feel like we’re walking around in a fog as we did back then.  Things seem very comfortable and familiar now and we certainly don’t feel like strangers anymore.  Even though we still get some funny looks!

This entry is a compilation of events and activities that have taken place in the last month.  We feel the Lord’s hand in our lives each day and feel blessed to be having this experience.  We’ve been asked to visit five families in the ward so are looking forward to that.  After having visited two of them we know this will be a wonderful experience.  We’ll take some pictures this month and put them on our next blog.

This picture is of the senior missionaries that were gathered together to watch general conference at the office yesterday.  We enjoyed the morning session then had pizza, salads, and desserts.  After the food, we got some spiritual food from the afternoon session of conference.  This is probably the last time we see the Schoenys as they are header home the middle of May.  We learned to love them very much.

Dinner with President Juan and Sister Silvina Orquera

On Friday night all the senior missionaries in the Area Office were invited to dinner with our Stake President and his wife at their home.  We were treated to a great time with them and a delicious dinner.  Sister Orquera has five sisters and five of them served missions.  The other got married young.  Their love was true from the beginning I guess because they were engaged before she went on a mission and he waited for her.  Their home was lovely and accommodated all of us very easily.  Their kitchen was as nice as any we have in the USA so the sisters were all a little envious because the kitchens in the apartments aren’t exactly cooking friendly.

The Orqueras recently adopted a little boy and he, of course, was the star of the show.  He has fat little cheeks and was very friendly to all of us.  We picked him up, kissed his cheeks and passed him to the next grandpa or grandma wanting to hold a little boy willing to get smothered with love.  He was still up when we all left at 10:45 p.m.  Their schedules are a bit different from those in the U.S.

Star of the Night--Juan Orquera baby

Seniors in the Orquera living room enjoying some conversations

Orquera dinner table set for the senior missionaries

Young Single Adults

It looks like vacation days are finally over here because school has started again and the young single adults are up for firesides again.  We hosted the Charla Fogonera last Sunday night.  It was very nice to have them together again in our apartment.  Priscilla (one of the ward representatives) brought a game about the prophets in modern days and we all played.  It was a little difficult for the new converts that don’t have much background in the Church or familiarity with the leaders, but it was fun and got us in the mood for General Conference this weekend.  Here is picture of the group.

Snacking after the lesson at the Bigelow apartment

Fiorella, Sister Bigelow and Elder Bigelow

Embassies in our Neighborhood

One thing that is quite unique about the area of Buenos Aires in which we live is that there are many embassies within a short walk from our apartment.  This morning we went out with the camera and took pictures of the embassies that are no more than 15 minutes walking distance from our apartment.  From the pictures you will see that we live in a very nice area of the city.  It is in these neighborhoods that we walk many days and mornings of a week.  It is a much calmer walk here than on the busy street where we live.

German Embassy

Australian Embassy/Albert Einstein also lived in this house for one month in the 1920s

These are only a sample of the beautiful embassies in this area.  The US embassy is a nice concrete building located near our office, but it is definitely not as picturesque as these, but it also needs to be much larger because the volumn of business done there.  The U.S. ambassador’s home is quite amazing however, and is located along a major avenue in Buenos Aires not too far from the office.  Mike had the opportunity of going to a luncheon and meeting there and said it was lovely.  All the senior couples that are here now are going to try to get a tour set up there.  We understand this is possible so I guess we just need to make some phone calls.  Hopefully they will speak English or Mike will have to do it.

Dinner with Elder Olivos and Elder Airrington in our little apartment

We spent an afternoon at the river and got a feel for the real Buenos Aires. Many men and sons fishing and families relaxing on lawn chairs having picnics. Look closely and you'll see the fishing poles leaning against the railing.

A sample of one of the tormentas that hit with a vengeance.

Life continues and we feel more at home all the time.  However, don’t think that we don’t know where our real home is!  We miss you all and send our love.

It’s hard to believe, but today is the 11th month mark of our mission!  That means 7 months to go.  When we look back it seems to have flown by, but when we look forward it still feels like a ways to go.

The couples that were here when we arrived are starting to go home and new ones are coming.  Dr. John Hollingsworth and Sharlene flew out last Tues., Susana, a single sister leaves this coming Thurs. and by the end of April all of them will have left.  We’re happy for them that they can go home and see their families, but also sad that they are leaving. They have felt like family and we will miss all of them.  We are in a unique place though, because we will have the opportunity to get to know the next group before we go home.  Over the past 3 months two couples have arrived, the Garvins and the Kellers, and by July we should have 3 to 4 more.  We so enjoy the companionship with all of them and are forming lifelong friends.