Elder Olson's mission (Paraguay Asuncion North Mission): East Coast Lighting up Loma!!!

Mon., 4/9/2018 (Loma Plata)

Wow has it been a good week! I'll just get right to it! We started off with some changes. Elder Trejo and I had to take a bus at 10 p.m. from Filadelfia to Abundancia Tuesday night, getting to bed at 12 midnight.

We got up at 3:15 to walk the 2 km back to the street, where around 4 a.m. or so the colectivo with the missionaries for changes passed. The new missionary in Abundancia is an Elder Falcon, who is from Argentina. My new companion is Elder... Castellaw! From... Oakton, VIRGINIA! Man let me tell you, it's been an awesome week! We get along really well and it's great just getting out to work! Elder Castellaw has 9 months in the mission and we met last Christmas when he won my white elephant gift- rubber ducky goggles! Elder Castellaw and I decided we just want to put in work for the next six weeks, and so that's what we did! Here are a couple experiences:

- while we were walking home from the terminal during the siesta (2pm, the hottest part of the day) with Elder Castellaw's stuff, we stopped for a moment in a tiny bit of shade, and said a quick prayer that God would send someone to help us, since we don't know anyone with a car and with a bunch of bags and around a km ahead of us, we were tired. Moments later, a car passed, went a block further, then circled back and offered us a ride right to our house!

-while we were walking along a busy street, a man in a car waved us over and asked us a question; "so is there a branch here now?" We told him no but we do have a group. He said he was visiting from Luque (Asuncion area), then pulled out 2 brand new hats and gave them to us! Nice guy!

-we were contacting and felt that we should go down a street that looked like houses from the states, even though normally we don't work in that area as much. We kept going until we found out the reason for going there: a member of the church was doing fencing outside and said he would be able to come to church and that he had just gotten here!

-Sunday night we were coming home after dark and it was really dusty. We hadn't done all of our studies yet, so we decided to get some studies in. We felt bad though because we were 1 short on our goal for new investigators for the week. We had the thought to look for someone the missionaries had met a few months ago and weren't able to find again, so we stopped by her house, and she was home! That really strengthened my testimony that if we want to work towards a goal for the Lord, he will always help us. That doesn't mean it'll be easy though. We will always have to clap at one more house, knock on one more door, or make one more call.

We have been blessed here in Loma Plata with a lot of new investigators, 4 investigators with new baptismal dates and 2 investigators in church (with us, that makes 4 people in church). We are hoping to have another great week on the grind out here in Loma Plata. Thanks for all of your prayers, emails, and especially photos!

Also on a random note, apparently Pte Matthew Harding [newly released Raleigh Stake President and new Area Authority] and Rocky Quiller [My parents Bishop when I was born and now a High Councilman in my home Stake] both sent letters (Pte Harding's was from 15 December 2018 hahaha) and I received them today. It's always nice getting stuff like that, even if it takes a while to get here!

Ya so my pictures aren't working but Elder Castellaws did so here are a couple of the week; hopefully they work out next week!

[Elder Olson forwarded his new companion's letter and pictures, so here they are:]

Whats gucciiii!!!

So crazy stuff went down this week and we had changes and I ended up in the Chaco! This area is the further most area in the Northern part of Paraguay. I had to take a 7 hour bus ride up to this area and it was wild, like super bumpy and dirt road only in the middle of the night. But I was met by my new comp Elder Olson and it was destiny or something because he is from North Carolina and we are the only 2 missionaries in our mission from the East Coast; and now were comps!!! So it was extremely hype and this whole week that's like all we've been talking about and just boolin out working up a storm here. And he is super motivated and hard working so we feana do big things this change.

A little about the Chaco, my area is called Loma Plata and the thing about the Chaco is that here is where all these Germans fled from Germany for religious freedom a long time ago. And so they rolled up here in Paraguay and made their own colonies and everything. And that grew to about 20,000 people now. And then we have the normal Paraguayans up here that move here to work for the Germans cause they run like everything. And then on top of that we have the Indigenous which are like indians that are like straight up Natives from old time Paraguay. And this group of natives are called Lenguas.

So the Germans are like impossible to do anything with cause they are all part of this religion called Mennonite. And they are very strong and want nothing to do with the Mormon missionaries. So we geek out sometimes and clap at their houses just to hear their rejections in Dutch. So we are working with the Paraguayans and a lil with the natives but they super don't speak Spanish but their other native language.

There are 4 areas here in the Chaco where there are missionaries. Filidefilia, Neuland, Loma Plata, and Abudancia. And there are only 8 elders here, one companionship in each area. And what's kinda cool about Loma Plata is missionaries legit just opened this area to missionary work and the church about 8 months ago. So there´s no ward or branch but we are a group and our job is to literally build the church here. Church on Sunday we had 4 people there: Me, my comp, and our 2 investigators Jose and Angel. And our church building is just the house right next to our house as seen in the picture. We have no members or really anything in our area and its hype to just be like yooo we are starting this and its our responsibility to get this going. And hopefully that's what we can do!

This first week was awesome in that it was my first week here but also that we went to work and put in that grind. We saw a lot of miracles and found a lot of great people. And blessed to have 2 of them come to church on Sunday. I know it's not gonna be easy and will be discouraging at times but I know that this is the work of the Lord and I am here for a reason. To spread and share his gospel and the special message we have for the people.

I love you all and thank you for the support and emails!

Rohayhu
Elder Castellaw