Something I wrote up this morning.

Yesterday was October 2nd! This is an important date for me for two reasons. 1) It is Mom’s Birthday – Happy Birthday (again) Mom! Hope you had a great time, sorry I couldn’t be there (again. I feel like I haven't been there for like the last three...). And 2) it marks one month of being here in Argentina! It’s weird to think that I’ve been here for an entire month already.
Life here certainly has become normal already as the excitement wears off. My Spanish has been improving rapidly and I can understand most of what people say (depending greatly on their level of patience, how quickly they speak, and their level of annunciation). I’ve found a great number of Spanish speakers don’t really open their mouths when they talk, making it really difficult to understand them-especially since it’s already hard enough to figure out what the words mean. I try to sit with Latinos during meals to practice my Spanish. Two nights ago I talked with my friend Miguel for about two hours (in Spanish, of course) about the book of James (the subject of our current Bible class) and cultural differences in relationships between Argentines and Americans and the pros and cons of each. It was a very good conversation and helped me to see how much Americans ignore truly seeking God’s direction in their relationships.
I have been wanting to visit the Hoyts for a while, and God has provided for me to be able to go this next week. I will leave Wednesday after classes to go to Buenos Aires, and take an overnight bus to Córdoba, where the Hoyt's will pick me up and bring me to their home in Carlos Paz. I will get to spend all of Thursday through Sunday there, then will take another overnight bus back Sunday night. I am really excited to be able to get away for a few days, visit some friends from home, have American food (anything other than the regular meals here), and just get away from the extremely busy schedule here. I really like it here, but not really being able to leave, or go anywhere really, starts to wear on you after a while. At least it does for me. This will probably be my only chance to go somewhere before I go back to Carlos Paz for the month of December. Compared to travel in the States, it is relatively cheap to travel by bus here, it will cost less than $100 round trip to take a 10 hr. bus ride each way. For about 5-10 dollars more you can have a seat the equivalent of 1st class in the states. Here, however, they just have an entirely different bus that costs more, with seats that can lay almost entirely flat. Maybe someday I'll get to try one of these, but for now I just want to get there and back to visit the Hoyts as cheaply as possible. :)
We are each assigned a "counselor" or mentor among the staff or missionary staff here on campus. The Lord has also provided another blessing in my counselor and his wife (Chuck and Darla) allowing me to wash my laundry at their house. They have a washer, and have very graciously offered to let me use it. Last time Darla even hung it out for me! They have a laundry service here that washes, dries, and even folds your clothes for a good price, 10 pesos (~$2.50) but when you don't have a lot of money, it really starts to add up. It has been a great lesson for me to see how God provides for us, though often it requires us to let go of our pride first. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of hanging my clothes out to dry, they get all stiff instead of having that nice comfy feeling of clothes that were dried in the dryer. I realized, though, that sometimes God provides something for us, but our pride stands in the way of us accepting it. God has provided a way for me to save some money provided I do a little extra work myself and have clothes that were hung out to dry instead of dried in the dryer. I guess having a dryer is just another one of those little things I realized I have taken for granted, but isn't really necessary.