Surprise New Companion

This week was a fairly normal week. We have been working, but we haven't
had much success in finding super good new investigators. We have
taught lots of people, but none that like made me super exited that
are for sure going to get baptized in the next 3 weeks.

On Thursday, for some reason, I was just dead tired, but I was able to persevere.
On Friday morning we got a call from Elder Menk saying that Elder
Nunes would get transferred to Santa Maria, and that Elder Andrade
would be my new companion. It was a little strange, given that it was
in the middle of the 6 week transfer period, and so my theory is that
President did it so that I could show the area to Elder Andrade for 2
weeks, and then I will get transferred on the actual transfer. And so
then Saturday morning we switched and I am here now with Elder
Andrade.

Elder Andrade is from Maranhão, which is a state up in the
northeast. He is friends with another Elder on the mission that Elder
Black trained, named Elder Jannsen (I did a division with him last
month). As a matter of fact, this Elder Jannsen is actually his (Elder
Andade´s) engaged brother -in -law, haha, and they ended up serving on
the same mission, cool right?
Elder Andrade is a really good missionary. He is from the same group
as Elder Menk. Elder Andrade has been bringing a lot of new ideas to
the work here which is really good.
Idon´t really have a whole lot to write this week. I hope you are all
doing awesome and that kind of stuff!

"At Least We Had a Baptism!"

Well, this week we had some interesting experiences.
On Tuesday, while we were up at the Northern part of the city, by the
URI (universtity), there was a crazy rain and wind storm, so some
workers invited us to hide in the building that they were remodeling.
Also, we taught a guy from a nearby city, Santo Antonio das Missoes,
that said that 6 years ago there was a hail storm there that dropped
hail as big as oranges! It apparently destroyed 90% of the city! That's
crazy!
Also, on Wednesday, we had another encounter with a difficult individual. Oh
goodness, that was tiring. When we entered in this guy's house,
and found out how antagonistic he was being, I just wanted to cry and die. I was
already super tired and drained from trying to be reasonable and well
mannered with the last one. And this one was not any different.
Anyway, the week was an extremely difficult week, very exhausting, and
very faith trying.
But hey, at least we had a baptism at the end of it all!

1- Feijão, I made beans and rice today for lunch

2- Baptism on Saturday

3- My shoe's not well. The shoe that had been resoled, the sole is all

worn down on one side...

4- $

Alifer

This week we taught, a few times, a 15 year old kid named Alifer. He has
been going to church for a few months and is going to be baptized next
week! He has been doing really well and has progressed a lot. He is reading
2 chapters of the Book of Mormon per day, and is quite excited for his
baptism. His friend that introduced him to the church just became a
priest and so he will baptize him! Cool right!?

On Thursday we had Zone Conference. It was really good. We learned
about John the beloved, it was really cool.
During the conference, I thought about the endless hours I have spent
on my mission walking in the hot Brazilian sun, looking for people to
teach, all the tiredness, difficulties, and toils. As I look back,
truly it has been a price that was a pleasure to pay.

On Saturday we had an encounter that kind of evolved into a bible bash...

actually, he started asking some extremely irrelevant questions, and I

responded to them, but then it just got out of hand, and I stopped bothering.

We testified of the Prophet Joseph Smith and of the truthfulness of the

Book of Mormon. As I testified, I felt the power of my words.

I am currently in the middle of Mosiah reading the BOM in Spanish.
Also, in the Old Testament in English, I am in Ezekiel (someday I will
finish!) I have been reading a great deal of General Conference
discourses lately. That's something that really strenghthens your
testimony of living prophets and apostles.

This Keyboard is really d d

*Mother's Note: Alex sent us a voice recording this week and I'm not sure how to share that - sorry! This is all he wrote!

Hey, I did another voice recording, so on that I said most of the stuff.
But this week was really good.
It is a good thing I voic e recordede because this keyboard is really
d d naabi cant write much on it

CARNAVAL

This week was a pretty tough week, but in the end had good results.
At the begining of the week I did a division with Elder Matos from
Manaus (The Amazon). It was good. He is way cool.
I have been studying a bit about Paul lately in the book of Acts.

There are a lot of cool stories. It makes me like our last name even more.
Friday was a tiring day. I was just really tired, mentally and
physically. It has almost been a year since I have been in the leadership
position of Zone leader or assistant. It is a lot of weight.
Then that night Alexandre , Luciana, and Milton (who Alexandre
baptized after I left the area) called me from Elder Menk's phone. They
are doing way good. It made me really happy. Alexandre is secretary in
the Elders Quorum now and they both went up to the Young Men's/Young
Women's camp to help out there and supervise stuff, sweet huh?! Milton
is also doing really well. He said that the church had giving him a
new life.

Sunday was good. We had 6 investigators at sacrament meeting. Four of the
six were men (that is really good).
Two of these men have great potential to be baptized next month.

One of these men is Ricardo. We just did a street contact with him and
he said that he had seen the movie "The Other side of Heaven", and had
like it a lot. We gave him a pamphlet, and invited him to church, and
got his phone number to schedule a visit. We saw him again on
Saturday, and he waved and said, "See you guys tomorrow at 8:30!" And
he came to church. He loved church, and then afterward when I marked
with him to teach him he said he had read the pamphlet, and wanted us
to tell him much more about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. He
said that he felt it was right. We marked for Wednesday. Today he
called and asked if we could mark sooner, for today or Tuesday. So we
did. Then he asked if he could meet us somewhere to get more materials
to study from us. I said we did, and he asked where we were and such,
we met up, and gave him the other pamphlets, and the Book of Mormon. He
commented that he had been studying about the apostasy using the
scriptures from the bible that are in the pamphlet and stuff. Wow. I
believe we will be able to baptize him quickly. He seems very elect.

The other man that came that can be baptized soon is Aldair. He and
his wife are the owners of a restaurant that is on the campus of the
URI, the university here in the city. His wife didn't come because a
visit showed up at their house, but he came anyway, and said that next
week he wants to bring the whole family.

So I'm pretty excited about these people. This week will be excellent!


Até mais!

*Mother's note: This week he entitled his email 'Carnaval' and then preceded to say absolutely nothing about it - so I thought I would do the same!*

Super-electness (is that a word???)

This week I did a division with Elder Janssen. He is the District leader in São Borja, a city way down on the border with Argentina. He was trained by Elder Black, that was my companion in the MTC. He is from Maranhão, up North. It was pretty cool. He lives on an island.

We are teaching a woman named Maristella, and here son Felipe. They are both really good, and the other son that is 15 listened to us last time, and she said that her husband said that once she has decided that this is really what she wants, he will listen and stuff too. We are really excited about them. They have read the Book of Mormon, and feel that it is true. They are searching for the truth. They went to church, and loved it. They were very well recieved by the Branch and a guy in the Branch Presidency even asked when we would teach them so that he and his wife could go with us.

I talked to Elder Menk, he said that in Santa Maria, Laura gave a talk on Sunday and that it was really good. Also Victor went to a Young Single Adult camp thing, like there was over at the Fresno temple like 2 years ago.
The other day I had a really good study about the gift of discernment. It was really aweosme. something to apply for sure.

Coming into the week, I was really excited about our teaching group, we had some really good families, that we were sure all were going to come to church, then by the middle of the week, a good part of our group seems to have probably fallen through. But then another family that I didnt even expect to progress much (Maristella´s family) is actually showing signs of Super-electness. They read, feel it is true, even said that they wake up happy when they know we are coming that day. And when they came to church, they were very well recieve by the members. So we are excited about that. Other than that, we have a lot of people that are going to progress or get cut this week. We are going to be looking for a lot of new investigators this week.
I hope you all have an awesome week!

I'll try to remember....

The little blue building is where we live

This was our lunch we made today, its called Carreteiro. Its a tradition and unique Gaucho meal, i´ll make it for you all some time and tell you its history

Carlos´s baptism, last week

This week I forgot my journal, so I don't know what to write about. I'll try to remember...

On Tuesday, Elder Claudio Costa came to our mission (he used to be in the Presidency of the seventy but now is the Brazil Area President). It was amazingly good -wow. He truly taught as someone having authority and not as the pharisees. After he had a meeting with us Zone leaders. It was really good.

Our work here in Santo Angelo is doing quite well. After a few weeks of work I am now finally happy with our teaching group. We have a good amount of people. We are teaching some really good familes. I am really excited about baptizing them in the coming month.

Everyday I am amazed with how much I learn and have learned on the mission. It really is absolutely amazing. On thing I have been realizing is that the hard part about missionary work is the mental part, the physical is easy. But to really do a good job, and have your "eyes fixed upon the glory of God" it takes a great deal of mental exertion to focus on what you are doing and not anything else.

Have a good week everyone!

I look forward to hearing more from you next week.