June 2, 2014

I uploaded pics onto a website called box.com.  It will have all the pics I took when I went to Porto Alegre.   I got to see the stadium where the World Cup will be held!  I have to stay inside and study, I think, during the world cup.  My goal for the week is going to be to read the Book of Mormon or Jesus the Christ.

June is going to go by fast!  Sounds like you guys are having fun!  What's the deal now with Blake?  How's his appendix and arm doing?  He can't stretch it out all the way?  And is it deformed looking?  Is he worried or does he think it looks cool?

I'm not ready yet for a brand new companion.  My mission is set up very well.  I won't have to train anyone for a few more months.  Which is good because my Portuguese is better and I can say a lot but I have difficulty explaining in Portuguese.  But I can understand almost everything.

My MTC teacher is in our ward.  His name is Brother Laferve and he's awesome and you'll have to tell him I say "hi."

Gabriel lives inside the bombed house but it is looking better so that's good.  We baptized his brother Heliel and they will stay active because they walk one hour to church every Sunday without their parents.  And they told us they want to be missionaries someday so that's awesome.

There's not really a lot in our area.  Some small shops like you'd see in Chinatown that sell World Cup jerseys and chimarrao stuff.  Chimarrao is a tea here that looks like weeds.  There are a lot of chiz burger places and meat stands. Nothing too exciting.  The meat stands give people stomach poisoning.  The chiz burgers are very different from American burgers.  When you come here you'll have to try one!

We went to the temple because that was the last transfer of my companion Elder Gee along with some other missionaries from his group.  They are all going home.  I got to see President and Sister Wright.  They're super awesome and it's fun to see them.  

The economy here is bad.  The food here is expensive proportionally to what is costs in the US.   A two liter soda bottle can cost 3-6 reals so I've had to learn which stores are the least expensive.  I like going to Wal-mart here because the prices are fairly good.  But American things are more expensive.  Like a can of Pringles is 8.45 reals and Nutella is 14-15 reals.  I usually only eat lunch with the members so I don't have to buy much food.

My new companion is Elder Andrade and I know him very well since he has been with me in this area the last 6 weeks.  So we are excited to work together.  I don't know if I'll stay in this area yet.  There are two sets of missionaries here like there is in the Brambleton Ward.

It sounds like Sophie is a lot of fun!  It sounds like when she gets really tired she starts to miss me!  Reading Harry Potter with Mason sounds like fun.  Sounds like it was good until he had to sleep on the floor in your room - haha!   I'll write to you guys again next week.  Check out the box.com account to check out my pictures!  You'll enjoy looking through that!