Matt's email 7/5/2010

Well I´m glad to hear that people still celebrate the 4th of July. Yesterday morning while getting ready for church the 3 gringos in the apartment were singing American songs and celebrating in our own way, but it doesn´t compare to Carrie Underwood and the parade that´s for sure. The Argentine independence day is the 9th and from what I hear it should be pretty legit. The people here love their holidays. They only work 4 hours out of the day anyways, but they still can´t get enough of their holidays.  We go swimming in the asekeas here which are like 2 foot gutters full of the most disgusting stuff anyone could ever find. No I´m kidding but I´m glad everyone is having fun. Right now I´m just posted up in a Subway in the middle of downtown Mendoza. I had a legit American sandwhich and I think I might go across the street and buy myself a bigmac from McDonalds. See I can celebrate the 4th too. This week was pretty lame. I failed to mention that 99% of the people here are 75 and older and the other 1% are the snakiest girls that I have ever seen. It´s uhh... pretty interesting. I have started being a lot more opinionated when I talk with people on the streets. The people here are arrogant and everyone says they read the Bible every day and blah blah blah but then I ask where the verse is that says you have to worship the Virgin and they proceed to tell me that it isn´t worshipping her when they cross themselves and pray to her but it is a form of respect. It is pretty ridiculous. The only place we ever have any luck is in the poorest of the poors. Places where they tell us not to go in the night because stuff goes down there. There are always police driving out on the BMW motorcycles with their beating sticks and hand guns. But yeah to make a long week short pretty much nobody listens to us. It´s way hard being rejected all day time after time, but it is the exact same thing that happened to Christ and His Apostles so how can I expect anything different? Elder Benitez and I are getting along well. He is pretty annoyed with the area and is sick of being here and he makes it known to everybody, which is way frustrating. I can´t wait to get a companion that hasn´t already been in an area 2 transfers so we can actually work. It seems like that has been the theme of the mission so far. Both of my companions just tell me that they want to get transferred and leave the area so they can have success somewhere else. It is pretty tough trying to motivate them to do anything. But it´s a battle out there and somebody has to win right? Anyways you wouldn´t believe how good at cleaning I am now. I have cleaned every single dish that anyone has ever used for the past however long I have been here. Nobody here knows how to use a sponge and soap so I slave away at the sink every night cleaning up after people. It´s great. I love it. Oh and also this week was a lot warmer. I guess there are a few months out of the year that are like transition months and they are the most extreme, but then everything settles down. It was fantastic. That´s all I got for the updates. You keep on celebrating there and don´t forget about me now. I love you all and wish you the best this week.
Love
Elder Burr