The Lords Hand Was in All of This....

Disclaimer......remember when Hayden said he was "severely protected"  well, I am a believer!!!   Since reading this like 10 times my mind has gone a bit crazy, BUT....sweet peace in my heart tells me he is ok and I am so thankful for his awesome sense of humor and the love he has for life and laughter and a Heavenly Father who loves and protects us all....especially his missionaries. 

hey there family,
                          so ive decided that this email is for all of whoever it may concern. this week was way cool. every morning we have gone over to an investigadors house and we have been helping them add on to their mud house. first we knocked down a small wall by karate kicks. my comp had a hammer and we called him thor for a bit. then after shoveling and sifting a bunch of dirt and rocks we layed a foundation to the walls we were going to put up. they used bricks made out of mud, held together by more mud. then a couple days into adding on this part of their house we had the opportunity to take out a bigger stronger wall. me and my comp took a video of us demolishing and destroying the concrete and brick mud that it was holding it together. with a combination of our man strength, my pick-ax, and his sledge hammer, we brang the wall down. after chuck norrising the wall to the the ground a willow of dust arrose and filled out nostrils and lungs. i caughed and im sure a brick came flying out of my nose. then moving on. we had to complete their roof. i gladly removed their small brick chimney. we layed down bambo sticks on top of the mud walls to be the roof. a black tarp on top of the bamboo, then we dumped a mountain of mud on top. the next day i had to do a division (where i go with a different missionary for a day) so my comp and another missionary finished the job with cement. we carved our names into their roof, of course. okay now the good part. on this division that i had with another missionary, we were late to lunch. we were absorbed into some conversation that at this point in my memory i cant recall. i dont think that you know what a kiosco is... but try to imagine that you live on a block, with no work, so you convert your window facing the street into a small store that contains chocolates, drinks, bread, all sorts of candies, and sometimes meat and cheese. okay. these kioscos have to be heavily guarded from the thieving 9 year olds running around. so they have a set of bars on the window facing the road. in the night, they cover the bars and the window with a metal awning. in the mornings and when they are open they prop up this awning to protect their window from the sun and the once or twice a year rain that comes through. argentines are midgets. so this awning was precariously placed, just like all other ones here, at about six foot and one inches. i have always been a bit of a matrix pro, but this one came out of nowhere. i was looking straight at the ground as we were walking very fast. the next thing that happens is that there is a loud noise, my head had stopped moving forward immediately while my body kept going, and the corner of this metal awning had just made best friends with my forehead. i blacked out. as i was falling to the ground, the awning slipped off of its holder and smacked me on the top of the head as well. this second hit brought me back from my blackout so i caught myself while the awning swung and slammed shut with a ferocious noise. incredible pain surged through my head. i waited to see if i would bleed, and like old faithful, it began. i crouched down, seeing stars obviously as the blood began to pour out of my face. i looked straight at the ground as the straight line of red life giving liquid escaped my head. the lady who lived there ran out of her house at this point to see my blood everywhere, my comp shocked and not saying audible words, and me laughing because of the enormous pain i was in. really when something happens you either cry or laugh. i took the summers path and laughed. she made a small squeel and ran back indoors. my comp at the time finally told me to stop the bleeding so i touched my forehead with two fingers. i didnt know where exactly i was cut. the blood didnt stop. so i took my whole palm and covered my whole forehead. it slowed down but didnt stop. i then felt the giant goose egg where i was takin out. the people invited me in, they gave me a gauze thing and we eventually slowed down the bleeding enough to wash things out. i got to a mirror and saw where i was destroyed. a lock of hair was underneath my scalp so i dug my fingers in, grabbed the hair, and pulled it out from underneath my skin. when i did this the flap of my scalp opened up and started bleeding again. we stopped the bleeding and i pulled back my scalp and saw my skull!! i almost touched it but i couldnt think straight. i showed my comp my skull and also the people who lived there. we left that house and got to where we were supposed to eat lunch. on the way we called the mission nurse. she gave me two choices. i could go and get stitches at the hospital... or use alcohol to clean the wound myself, super glue my scalp to my skull, then tie the hairs on each side of the laceration together to hold it in place. i was in favor of the second option, more manly of course, but we decided stiches was cheaper to do. so the sister who we were to eat with was a nurse for 32 years. she saw my blood and pain and snapped into nurse mode. she called this ex-police guy who is the mission leader for a different ward and they took me to the hospital. now an argentine hospital is 0 percent like an American hospital. you see bugs crawling on the floor, dogs sleeping in the hallway, the lights are hanging off of the cieling, water damage, floor damage, and it basically is a place for hurt people to come and die. we got there and the sister who was a nurse got me in the emergency room right away. all the while the bleeding hasnt stopped leaving my gapeing hole in my face. they layed me down, a nurse who worked there came and looked at me and told me she was going to do the stiches right then and there. as she said this, a real doctor walked by, saw that we were white and he recognized the missionaries. he looked at my head and said ´no worries, ill take care of this.´ after he stitched me up, they took an x-ray of my skull to see if i had any cracks up there. then they sent me away, and i kept my x-ray :) so now they have me on some medication and they seemed to have stitched a tampon looking object over my laceration. so yeah that was my adventures for the week. they wont let me leave and work more than about half an hour in the sun for a week. this happened on saturday. so yeah. but a note for this whole story of how the Lords hand was in all of this. 1. the awning hitting me for the second time and awakening me from my blackout. 2. the family that was nice and let me bleed all over their sidewalk, kitchen sinks, and bathroom. 3. the sister who was a nurse for 32 years and got us into the emergency room asap. 4. the ex-police guy who drove and illegally parked his car right at the entrance. 5. a real doctor spotted us missionaries and said he would stitch me up and not a random girl nurse. 6. the fact that there were about ten other patients in the room that they put me in who had crazy injuries to their legs and arms and all of the nurses and doctors huddled around the hurt gringo. and finally number 7. i have a tampon on my forehead so everyone sees how rediculous i look. im pretty sure that i have a concussion but they didnt check for that at the hospital. when i went to bed that night i was half expecting not to wake up haha. oh boy it was a fun day. but that was my story, im fine now, no worries. i have some medication, its like an argentine ibeprofin but a little better and some antibiotics so i dont get an infection. my skull looks way cool, in x-ray form or just me seeing it in the mirror under my scalp flap. so yeah. what an adventure no? :) love you all!

200 Empanadas

hey dad,
man that sounds like it was a great sunday. in our sunday meeting yesterday we had 20 people there, two priesthood holders, and the rest were kids and woman members. the work is tough but we are having fun when we dont get the results that we want so we dont go crazy. a few times ive gotten so frustrated i just punch my pillow, but ive picked up the habit of doing pushups to calm myself down, or just kicking the crap out of a soccer ball. it helps temporarily, kind of like drugs, but its all i got. but the best thing i do to calm down is read. doesnt matter what piece of doctrine it always helps. i think the 4 gospels are the most soothing to read, and the book of mormon is always the best. im trying to finish the spanish book of mormon before my year mark, hump day, but i still get mad. i have really been missing fishing lately. this was my first fishing season in my life that i can remember not going out and castin the old vibrex into the hole. man, those are good times. dont worry though im doing what im supposed to. the activities you had sounded awesome, i think ive forgotten what an actual ward does when they are active and have resources to have cool things and fun activities. all in due time. okay dad thanks for the letter, love ya.


allright mom your just the best. its just a fact. i got my packages on tuesday i believe and they were oh so amazing. i couldnt have asked for anything better than what i got so thank you! there was just so much stuff i dont know what i liked most, probably all of it, yeah that. it made my week way good. yesterday was mothers day here in argentina. on saturday me and my comp helped make over 200 empanadas, i dont know if you know what those are but they are good, google it. we made them and yesterday after church we got all us 20 or something people in the branch together and ate those, tiny sandwiches, pop, and had an average argentine cake to top it off. me and my comp just did what we do, they had cameras there and of course i had to show off my muscles everytime a picture was taken. then i got the cake, ran around with it, almost dropped it, saved myself, set it down. almost threw a little kid into it a few times but in the end it was safe. besides the incidents yesterday with the mom day thing nothing interesting happened all week. me and elder whittle have started a competition to see who can kill the most flies by catching them in our hand, shaking them up, then throwing them as hard as we can at the wall. we always rack up the kills at lunches because the families never talk to us and flies are all over. its definately possible to have fun in the lamest of situations. im glad i got elder whittle or else i dont know if i could do this area without going crazy, God must know what he is doin right? thanks for everything mom, your the best. period. love you lots mom

Bored in the Dark....

To Nan….
so a couple weeks ago we were in a discussion and the power got cut. so we left there and walked home and the whole city had the power cut. it was late at night and the only lights were the ones from cars. we got home and decided to test ourselves and our emergency skills. we got all of our earthquake things out, in the pitch dark. we found our flashlights but said we didnt need to use them. so my comp went and washed some socks, some plates, we both got undressed and changed into our night clothes. then i went to the bathroom all off of sound and smell. we were done and bored in the dark. so naturally what does one do in this situatuation.. make pancakes of course. so in the pitch blackness of everything me and my comp found the flower, powdered milk, pinch of salt, egg, strawberry extract, fork, bowl. i put all the stuff in not knowing the proportions but just feeling how thick it was by stirring. then we got all the plates ready before we lit the stove which gave a tiny bit of light. i cooked all the pancakes and just when the last one left the pan the lights came back on. no mess or anything was to be found. also i had a war with my wart i found on my caliss for my pinky finger. i finally had to stab it with a blunt end of my flathead screwdriver and it bled everywhere. we bandaged it up and left to go work. we were in a lesson and in a spiritual moment i looked down to find my hands covered in blood. without thinking i lifted up my hands and asked them if they could help me. my hands were just covered. they freaked out for a second but my calm demeanor i think helped them out. they gave me a giant ball of gause cotton. whenever we go to this one families house to eat they always have us bless something or other. usually it is to the old grandma to make her feel more calm. there ive blessed a kiosco (like a little kiosk with food and snacks), my comp blessed their truck.the shoes are great i wore them to church and they were super shiny.
the work is as tough as ever. dealing with drunks is great too. love elder hayden summers

Whatever you cook for me I am going to eat!!!

To Bart....
the end of the season is always when the coaches wake up and try to change something. once we get a coach to change something that needs changing when it needs to be done is when they will be successfull. also ive decided that i will never ref a sport because i dislike them so much i dont want to wear those same colors. you can always tell who´s team your on by the way you dress yourself. everyone knows who´s team the missionaries are on thats for sure. sometimes we get people that run away from us because they are either afraid or just know that we are here to fix their sinful lifes. some people can even tell when we talk to them that we are sent from God. we often declare to the people that we have the authority to tell them that they are doing wrong and help them change. honestly i like this alot haha. im not going to be able to do this again for a very long time so im trying to take advantage of every second.
ive also decided that whatever you cook for me i am going to eat. i will not take pickles off of my hamburgers, onions off of my liver, or tomatoes off of my food ever again. you can hold me to that promise later on when your making me a giant dinner sometime in the future.
yeah the scriptures are amazing, ive been reading in the gospels and the life of christ and the apostles and it is just great stuff. im soaking in every word and clinging to every teaching. i wont even recognize my family when i get home, thanks for being a great example dad to my little bros. it sounds like they need it more and more as the world gets crappier and dumber.
thanks for everything dad. when i get home is when i can do anything crazy and ill just spend all my blessings saved up hah. love elder hayden summers

To Nan...
conference was lagit and way cool. kind of fun even. one of the missionaries had his parents here and they were up watching it in english with us gringos. we talked to the mom and the dad too. the dad was way funny and talking just about stuff was way cool. its crazy how conversations with people are sometimes just what you need to feel good. of many things ive learned here, talking face to face with someone is the best way to help and really mean something to someone. also hugs work alot too. i cant really hug anyone outside of missionaries and other dudes here but im going to be a hugger when i get home for sure. i should get the packages on tuesday or wednesday. its a long process because once the packages finally get here they stay in the mission offices until the begining of every month.it was a boring week besides conference. im with my comp for another month and a half so we are pumped up. i just love it here. stay safe up in the north, snow should be rolling around by the end of this month, send me pics of it? :) love ya mom!