Black Out

The week has gone perfectly well. The only un-normal occurrence was Tuesday...

Last Tuesday night around 8 o´clock the power was cut. Upon going to our lightless chapel to have ward council, the Bishop told us that in fact all of Salta's lights were out. I sort of supposed it was a neighborhood thing. But no, all of the city was without lights. That got Elder Fuentes and I semi-nervous about the hermana missionaries in Mitre, because Mitre is kind of not the safest place in Salta. But when we finally got a hold of them they were totally all right. The lights were on about two hours later. Turns out the lights did not just only go out in Salta, but in Jujuy and Tucumán. That's a pretty huge black out.

Besides that the Zone is progressing very well.

We have lots of stellar missionaries and misioneras and everyone seems to be happy. It´s a lot easier to work with people when they are happy. We continue to teach a mixture of part member familias and college-age students. This last weekend was elections for a new governor and mayor of Salta. SO all the college students had to go back home to vote (and if they don´t, they get taxed, huh), so church wasn´t as jammed-packed with investigators as it could have been. BUT, Alberto, who was baptized about a month ago, is still very much strong. He went to priesthood session of General Conference and to a session on Sunday, and now comes always in his Sunday best.

As for today we went bowling as a district and later we all made/ate tacos. The two chileans in my district (Elder Fuentes and Hermana Castro) made sopapilla (I think that's it) with chancaca. Sopapilla is like scones with squash in it and Chancaca has the consistency of honey and the flavor of brown sugar with black licorice. You dip your sopapilla in the chancaca. Elder Fuentes recently received a package with Chancaca in it, hence the big deal of getting to eat it...

Thanks for all of your love, support, and prayers.

Love,
Elder Barnes

PS
There is a 60+ year old man sitting by me playing chess online with a younger opponent who, by the old man's swears, I believe is consistently beating him.