Snow in Utah

Here are 2 pictures from when Cooper was in the Missionary Training Center in Utah. It snowed all through the spring! Now it's winter in Argentina, so he should be getting his coat out again!

His email last week had the subject line "Hace frio aqui!" which means "It's cold here!" He was sweating through the heat and humidity in Baltimore, so his poor body probably doesn't know what season it is now!

Coop's 2nd letter in Argentina!

6/23/08

Yay! Here is Cooper's 2nd letter from Argentina:

Hola!,

So I´ve been in Paraná for a week now, and it´s been a great week! I´ll start by telling you a little about the country. There´s still a lot of problems. When I met the bishop earlier this week (our bishop is crazy by the way, it´s really funny) his wife told me "Bienvenidos al Infierno". (Welcome to hell.)

I know they had a country-wide strike on Wednesday, meaning they blocked all the highways I guess, and wouldn´t let food through. The whole food strike doesn´t really affect us honestly, we can still get pretty much everything they´re trying to stop from getting through. I don´t know I guess there´s just not enough farmers to stop everything.

Also a couple days ago we couldn´t get any water and we found out that some people who were angry at the government broke some water pipes and did something so the whole city couldn´t get water. It was ok though they must have fixed it pretty quickly because we had water again by that night. YEAH!! Oh and did I tell you how the water here works? Everyone has a water tank on top of their house and when it runs out you go outside and turn a little knob so that fills it up again. Then when you hear water pouring all over the roof you go and run back outside and turn it off.

So yeah that´s a little bit about what´s going on, in other news I found a cucaracha on my cama yesterday morning haha. (cockroach on my bed) Ok that´s enough about the country, now on to the missionary work. I´m finally working in the field where I´m supposed to be and it´s great and we´re really trying to work hard.

And my goodness I feel like I´ve learned so much since I´ve been here. Especially about the Atonement. We listened to an old talk about the Atonement that one Elder had on a cd, and I feel like it totally changed the way I see the Atonement and I finally understand why it had to be. And all the work that we´ve been doing has taught me a lot too.

We´re whitewashing this area, which means we totally replaced the missionaries here before us, and they left us with nothing. This last week we taught over 90 lessons. (A lesson meaning teaching any principle and leaving a commitment). And finally one old couple let us into their house. I just don´t understand how people don´t want anything to do with something so wonderful that we are so willing to give. And I know it´s just a taste of what the Savior feels. It can get you down when someone rejects the gospel after you share it with them but then once you start talking to someone else you feel great again.

Oh I´ve also got some good news for RJ, if he reads this. Great news, the Wisconsin waterfall is alive and flowing through Argentina. The mullet is IN here! YEAH!! haha, I´ve got funny news for Bryce too. All the little Argentine kids are way into Dragonball Z here. They play this little card game that´s way funny to watch.

It´s really funny to see all the things that come here from America. We actually just ate at a McDonalds. Which was dumb cuz it´s really expensive and the same as in the states, but the other Elders wanted to go so we went. And McDonalds here is SO funny. It´s like the 5 star restaurant of the city. If you´ve got a hot date or a business deal to close then it´s the place to be. And I´m not joking.

Also about the mail. I haven´t gotten any DearElders or anything. The only time we get mail is when we have a zone conference or something, cuz they bring it to us from the mission home, so about twice a month we get mail.

And also, Mom it´s your birthday in about 6 days, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! You´ll be getting a letter but it could be a while, like 2 weeks. haha sorry. I told Lauren I would send her a letter as soon as I could once I got here, but I wasn´t able to send anything until today. I´m sorry Lauren! We don´t have a mail place in our area so I had to wait until today. But I think I´ve got the mail figured out now so hopefully I don´t get delayed in sending stuff anymore.

Ok well that´s about all for now. I´m gonna go try and get all the pictures on my camera copied onto a cd right now so that I can send it home. Oh and I wanted to ask, Did you ever get that box full of letters and pictures that I sent from the MTC?Ok, talk to you again next week! Sounds like things are going well at home, that stinks about the house though. Hopefully moving isn´t as much of a pain as it was last time. Love you all,
Love,

Elder Boice

Using his spare time wisely

Here is another picture Cooper took while in the MTC. I don't know if Cooper created this magnificent work of art in his spare time or if some other missionaries made it for him. Either way, I think the expression on Coop's face is kinda funny. Good to see those missionaries using their time wisely. (wink)

Don't Do Anything Stupid!

I don't know if you can see this picture very well, but I think it's really cute. I love the expression on Cooper's face as he points to the sign with a quote by President Gordon B. Hinkley that says "Don't Do Anything Stupid!" ha ha

Cooper's new email address in Argentina is:

boice.c.t@myldsmail.net

You can also write to him via www.dearelder.com using the "Argentina, Rosario" mission dropdown on the menu choice. He'd love to hear from you!

Ab Crunch Machine

I haven't heard the story about these pictures yet. Coop just mentioned that there was a missionary going to Spain on his mission where I went. (Love the T-shirt!) Looks like Cooper took advantage of this missionary's assets to work on his ab crunches. Ouch!

Missionary P-day attire

Here's another picture of Coop back when he was in the MTC. It must have been on the same day when he was parting his hair in the middle to look like a nerd. ha ha

Here's the letter he emailed today (June 30, 2008):

Hola!
Yep I´m still alive and holding on over here. Haha. Thanks so much for the email mom! And for the Pictures! I loved them. I had to mess around with the computer a little bit but I figured out how to see the pictures. So thank you!

Oh man, so Michael´s going to Phoenix?! And Mahonri to India?! That´s so cool! And yeah you´re right that´s where Alan just got back from. It was super funny to hear his Indian accent when he got back. Tell them congrats for me when you see them!

Oh and no I haven´t received any DearElder letters yet. They only give us our mail during Zone Conference and transfers. So apparently we only get mail about every 4-6 weeks. Kind of a bummer. But I just started mailing letters a week ago, and I think it takes 2 weeks for my letters to get to the states, you´ll have to let me know. So they should get there about a week from now! I hope so at least. Oh and what´s this with keeping the letters short so that I have more time to write? I need to know what´s going on over there too!

Ok I´ll tell you a little about my week here now. Nothing too exciting happened though I don´t think. We´ve just been working a lot trying to find people. And it´s a lot harder to find people than I thought it would be...Although it´s kind of funny to see all the different things people do to hide when we come knock on their door (We usually clap actually).

It´s rare when people actually open the door, usually a lady will open a window and just tell us she´s busy, or a kid will come and say that their parents aren´t there. So then we ask the kid to go ask his mom when she´ll be back (cuz we know she´s there) and he goes and asks her and then tells us. Also it´s funny when we see people looking through the key hole or trying to sneak a peak through a curtain to see who it is at the door. That´s what usually happens. My trainer says a lot of the Argentines are like teenagers who haven´t quite grown up yet. haha I dont know he may be right.

So yep, we´ve just pretty much been looking for people. We taught over 100 lessons this week, all at the door, we never got in a house. And we were able to give ONE Libro de Mormon (Book of Mormon) finally!! Besides that, we´ve been sworn at a lot and had rocks thrown at us a few times and two sets of Elders were robbed this week. Don´t worry not me. One was our zone leaders who got mugged, but the other set of Elders I´m not sure where they are but they came home at night and their door was laying on the ground and EVERYTHING was gone... Even their pillows and the food in the fridge! How much does that stink?!!

It seems like a lot of the Argentines are sick right now too, con el gripe (with the flu). And one of the Elders in our pinch (apartment) got sick a couple days ago.

Oh here´s a good story, kind of. We were walking around the other night not sure what to do because we didn´t have any appointments and people start to get mad when you knock and it´s too late... So we were walking around and I saw this lady trying to get our attention on the other side of the street. We´re not allowed to contact the women here (the Argentine guys get angry when we talk to them), but we walked back over to her, cuz I heard her call out Elder! And when we got to her she just started crying. Apparently she had been a member for 12 years, but she was smoking and obviously wasn´t active any more. But she wanted us to go over to her house and teach her, so we did. (which was ok cuz her uncle was there). So we went to her house, which was weird cuz there were no lights, only a couple candles cuz they couldn´t afford the electricity. And when we were there some guy came by who wanted to buy drugs. But she yelled at him and said No! We´re hearing the word of God right now! Then the lady told us she was on her way to go buy cocaine when she saw us and it changed her mind. So we shared a little lesson on the Atonement and she said we were angels. She was a little crazy though and it wasn´t too hard to tell why. So I hope it helped her a little bit. You just have to remember there´s no accidents in this work.

Well that´s about it for this week. My comp (companion) just told me that next week is transfers so I won´t be writing again until next Tuesday. Oh and there´s one more thing I wanted to know. Could you find out and let me know if Lauren is still going to go to China? She should have found out by now and it´s killing me cuz I really want to know! If you could find out and let me know in your next email I´d really appreciate it! That´s all for this week. Let me know how everythings going at home and how everyones doing. I love you all!
Love,
Elder Boice

Coop's MTC district

Here are a few pictures of Cooper with his MTC district. All of them are scattered around Argentina now!