General Conference 1975 versus 2011

General Conference occurs twice a year, once in the spring and once in the fall. The President of the Church and other leaders speak in five two-hour sessions over Saturday and Sunday. They provide counsel, direction and explain doctrine. I have always enjoyed General Conference and have been inspired by the messages. Sometimes I have attended in person, sometimes I watched satellite broadcasts at our local meetinghouse and more recently I watched sessions at home over cable TV.

In the fall of 1975, I was serving my mission in the small town of Villa Nueva in the province of Cordoba, Argentina. No one there had a TV. The owner of the pension in which I was living had an old, old shortwave radio that sat on top of the refrigerator in her outdoor kitchen.




One Saturday evening after dinner, I remembered it was General Conference weekend and asked if I could try and find a broadcast of it on the radio. Argentina is 3 hours a head of Utah. I tried and tried and tried...finally through ear shattering static I could barely detect the voice of one of the speakers at General Conference. The voice only lasted a few seconds before the static drowned it out, but I felt elated that I had made contact. And that was it for General Conference the two years I was in Argentina.

This is General Conference weekend, fall of 2011. I am back in Argentina. I watched all five sessions of General Conference! One session I watched live in the local meetinghouse via satellite in Spanish from 9pm to 11pm, Argentina time.

This is how I watched the other four sessions, live and in English...


On the web...even used my iPad!

Am I grateful for the technological advances? Yes, I am. Am I addicted to technology gadgets? Yes, I am. I inherited that from my father.