October 27, 2014
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| Our sketchy Lan house. |
P-day was productive but very tiring. We had bills to pay, Sister V needed new
shoes (which are nearly impossible to find, good ones that is), she also needed
a new memory card, and I needed to go to the post office. In Freguesia, where I used to live with
Sister Burris, we could have gotten all these tasks done in 1-2 hours,
tops. Today, it took so long because we
had to walk most of the way – not really what I wanted to do on our day
off. We ended up getting everything done
in about 3 hours. Emailing was a huge
relief to me today. It was so good to
hear that Dad’s stem cell transplant is finally in the works. I am worried about the transplant recovery
process, but I know that with prayer and fasting we will find comfort in this
process. It is just great that Dad is
finally able to move forward with his treatment.
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| Sister Vieira making endless phone calls to people who NEVER answer the phone. |
Side note: When you are with a Brazilian companion you are a
lot more stressed about money/finances because they are ALWAYS stressed and
short on money. I am pretty frugal and I
fill out all of my reimbursement forms as soon as possible to get my money
back! My companion, well she just
doesn’t understand money management. She
never worked or had any sort of responsibility with money before she left on
her mission, so it is a bit of a struggle for her. She will spend $6 on ice cream and then not
have money the next day for a bus fare. But,
I’m trying to help her, and she is learning about how to manage funds.
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| A new mission rule is to carrying a Book of Mormon in your hands at all times...it's one grimey sweaty little blue book. |
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| My companions version of exercising. |
October 28, 2014
My body is so stinking tired all the time! My knees, back,
and feet just HURT! Besides the pain,
today was a great day! We had a good
district meeting (Elder Mountain always comes really prepared to teach.) I got to know Elder Barlow who is our new
zone leader. We miss Elder Morcies a
whole lot. Elder Barlow is very nice,
but also very quiet and stiff. I am sure
he will grow on us. Afterwards we went
with the zone leaders to pick our ZONE T- shirts!
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| Giant moth |
I ‘ve been striving to follow the Spirit in order to find
new people to teach – and today I got the strong impression to talk to a cute
family that was walking down the street.
Well, it turns out that they are legally married for 7 years; they don’t
have a particular religion or a religious background, they love each other, and
they are receptive. The only challenge
is that the man works 6 days a week straight, and then he has 2 days off, so we
will have to make our first follow up visit next week. But they are interested!
We also had a good experience teaching F., who is a sweet
lady who makes sweets for a living. I
found her last week during divisions and she is so nice. She is actually looking for a church, but has
been turned off by the ways that pastors have lied to her. I understand where she is coming from because
we have seen many things here that would make your jaw drop. Thing people throwing money on the ground,
scanning credit cards to enter the church, etc.…anyways she has a lot of potential
and we are excited to work with her and her family.
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| The Santa Cruz Seminary Class - sharp kids! |
October 29, 2014
Today was HOT. We
marked to visit some less active members with two women from the church who are
visiting teaching companions. They are
so cute and nice, and we had a wonderful time working with them. It warms my
heart to see two older ladies in skirts and sandals with Liahonas and cute handouts
to give to their sisters. I learned a
lot about the importance of listening and sympathizing with people you
teach. One lady we visited did nothing
but complained for about an hour solid.
Life for her is hard. I decided
that I need to develop a lot more charity in order to be a good visiting
teacher.
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| Lunch with a great young family in our ward! |
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| This is our young ward mission leader who is also a recent convert and is preparing for his own mission. |
October 30, 2014
The odd compliment from the scriptures: “Fear not therefore,
ye are of more value than many sparrows.”
Today was a good day, filled with good sit-down lessons
where you really feel like your are helping people. We taught S. who recently
had a stroke and has been battling with frustration and depression because of
her physical limitations. Her dog died
last night and today she was just sitting on her front porch crying. It was pretty sad, but it was also a neat
experience because we hadn’t plan on visiting her but felt that we should stop
by. We shared a message and at the end she said that we were the answers to her
prayers.
It is really heating up here in Rio. Right now it is 82.4 degrees in the house and
it is 10:25. We decided that the heat
was dragging us down so we made a companionship goal to use our allotted hour
for dinner to rest from the heat. Most
missionaries power through this hour and just kill themselves walking and
starving. So we decided to some home around 4-5 when everyone else is not
answering doors. We take a shower, eat
something, and sit and rest with the fan blowing on us. We did that today, and it made a lot of
difference in our energy level for the evening.
We were happier, healthier, and felt the Spirit much more. We worked hard today and had really good
results but my body isn’t aching like it usually does.
October 31, 2014
Today was another hot one…I am praying so hard, pleading
really, that my body will hold out another 6 1/2 weeks, because these
conditions are rough. But, on the bright
side, I am grateful for the small blessings: like a functioning shower and
toilet, good shoes, and deodorant. You learn a lot about gratitude when you
have to look beyond a rough situation.
We had a day full of people making excuses about why they
can’t come to church or why they break the commandments. It was a long day and Sister V lost her
patience a few times. But for whatever
reason, I remained calm and helped us respectfully and carefully walk away from
some hard situations. There are many people
that will never hear what you have to say because they are so
hard-hearted. But on the upside, we were
able to teach L. and F. today. They both
are slowing progressing and I am learning and developing a lot more patience
here.
Side Note: I am having a very hard time with the heat,
especially thinking and speaking in Portuguese.
I am really quite fluent now, but lately I have been struggling a LOT to
express myself, which is frustrating for me.
It has gone from “Oh, are you from Southern Brazil?” to, “um, what is
she saying?” Very frustrating.
Other side note: I still don’t know what our purpose is here
in Santa Cruz. I really don’t know if I
am making a positive difference in anyone’s life.
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| Sister V., trying to stay dry |
November 1, 2014
We miraculously found our investigator’s house on our
own. The only problem was that his wife
was home and she was very reluctant to let us in. At first she was very cold and closed off,
but we just started talking to her and asking her questions. Before you knew it, she was smiling and asking
us questions. She confessed that her
friends had told her that we are a cult, and that we didn’t believe in the
bible, etc.…! We were able to make
friends with her and clear up her concerns.
She accepted our challenge to pray about Joseph Smith and she gave us
her phone number to make further appointments with her. Towards the ends of our discussion with her,
her husband showed up quite drunk…hum.
November 2, 2014
UGHHHHH!!!!! I just feel like I am not even making a
difference in this area, and I am feeling extremely unmotivated. My companion doesn’t help too much on the
motivation side of things. I am feeling
myself losing steam, and I just don’t feel like my regular goal-oriented
self. Once again, no one came to church,
and once again not one of our investigators is progressing. We taught 24 lessons this week and not a
single person we visited came to church.
It is discouraging. But, I know
that our time is not the same as the Lord’s time and He put us here for a
reason. I really don’t know what that
reason is. I just hope and pray that I
am helping someone through this arduous mission of mine.
