Did you not tell him they were the Lord´s cheeps?

Whaddup people

 

I am finally, finally in MY area, with MY trainer, starting MY mission in Londrina. No more waiting, no more busrides, no more airplanes, I am freakin here. It seems like it´s taken forever to get here. Nevermind the fact that I started my mish two years later than most, but I´ve waited on visas, waited on transfers, waited on people to arrive. I know the clock starts tickin when you arrive at the MTC, but I havent felt like my mission really started until I got here. And now I´m here, and now it´s time to rock out. I´ve got to be better than I have been, I´ve got to do anything I possibly can to feel the spirit, so that I can more effecttively teach my brothers and sisters. Anything less is a disgrace to my Father, my brothers and sisters, my family and lastly, to me. Everything in my life has happened for this reason. I´ve been prepared since I was born to do this, and I cant even entertain the thought of slacking off, or wasting time. If I slough off, then everything was for nothing. All the pain, all the waiting. So I´m here, and I´m going to work as hard as I possibly can, and then I´m going to push past it, and work harder. The Lord has blessed me soooo much. I can understand my companion already, and I´m just being blessed right and left with the language. All of the language rules, all of the grammar, is just coming to me as fast as I can speak it. I want to show everyone how grateful I am, by how hard I work. Every single one of you that I´m writing, has helped me in some form or another. Thank you, tao muito, for everything that you´ve done for me. Dad, thanks for all that hard work. I´ve always been grateful for it, but here out on the mish, it´s going to really pay off. Mom, thanks for all the love. Miles, Ashley, thanks for being the best brother and sister anyone could ask for. Bishop, thanks for sticking with me, and not giving up on me. To the rest of you, thank you, for even the smallest amount of time that I spent with you. I am so grateful for my life. I know the best people. I am so blessed. I am so grateful for this opportunity to serve a mission for my Heavenly Father. This is such a blessing. One of the main reasons I came on a mish is to "give back" to meu Pai Celestial, but now Í just dug the pit deeper :) I´ve learned sooo much, about Him, about myself, about families, and about life. This is the best decision I´ve ever made.

 

Well, I guess I´ll tell you about my week.

 

I´ve been staying with the secretarys until the other novo missionarios arrived. Weeell, they finally arrived. It was awesome staying with Elder Miller, he is the friggin man. He´s from Lumberton, which is about 45 minutes from Tomball, meis ou menos. I hope we become comps later in the mish, but prob not, because we get along too well. So we pack up all of our stuff, and we head out to meet up with the other missionarios. We all head to the mission home, and have a welcome...meeting with Presidente Leal and his wife, Sister Leal. We all get new sheets, new pillows, and other stuff, eat lunch, and take off. I love that man so much, and I am so glad he will be my mission president for at least a little while. We head to the bus station, and I take off. I´ve been led to believe that I will be meeting my comp that day, but alas, it was not so. We stayed with some other missionaries, and me and Elders Piano and Timothy took off to teach some lessons that night. We taught about the restoration, and my part of the lesson was on the actual restoration. Now, I´ve had trouble with this section more than the others, I dunno why, it´s just the way it is. When it became my turn, the words just flowed. Most other times I still suck at portugues, but when we´re doing contacts, or teaching lessons, I can speak just fine. The lesson went really well, and we ended up teaching 3 more people other than the 1 that we came to teach. So we head back to the apartment, and when I was unpacking for the night, I realized that in my hurry to leave the other apartment, I had left half of my clothes there. So life 1, Elder Standard 0. Tudo bem, I´ll be able to do laundry in the morning. We got to sleep, wake up, and take off. This was quite awesome.We had to walk about 3 miles to the bus station, with all of our belongings, down the streets (see pictures in the other email). After crossing a highway, we arrive, I meet my comp, and we take yet another bus to our area. We arrive, I unpack, and we come to find that we dont have any laundry detergent. Life 2, Elder Standard 0. Tudo bem, we´ll just go to the store and buy some. We do, I finally am able to do laundry, and we take a breather. Elder shows me his family, which includes his hot sister, and then I show him all of my pics. There is now no doubt in Elder Lima´s mind if I like guns or not. BTW, I´ve got a ton of pics on my memory card, but not all of them show up when I try to play them on my camera. If any of you know how to fix this, please let me know. Otherwise nobody knows what my family looks like. So yeah, we head off to write emails, which brings me to.....now.

 

If anyone has

 

Brother Wake´s email

Ngoc´s email

Fernando´s email

 

And could remember to send those to me, that would be kinda awesome. I´ve gotta go now, so remember that I love you, and we´ll see each other soon enough.

 

Elder Standard

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Here´s me addy

Elder Mate Standard
Av. higienòpolis, 1100 - sala 61
86020-911 - Londrina, PR, Brasil

If you´re going to send stuff, tape pictures of Jesus to it so nobody will open the package. It´s kinda hard to break a commandment when you have about 10 little Jesus´ staring at you.

Stay classy America,
Elder Standard

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Shaving cream woes and first impressions

OMG, I just had like, 3 paragraph written up and then since I´m not used to this friggin keyboard I accidentely erased everything. So, here´s what I said -

So here I am in Brasil. I´ve been here about 3 dias now, and so much has happened that I´ll only be able to write a little bit of what I´ve done.

Oh, and BTW, if there´s alot of typos in my emails, forgive me. This keyboard is slightly different than the American one. The apostraphe is in a different place and the shift key is itty-bitty. I keep fat fingering everything and it´s drivin me nuts.

So, the flight/s were uneventful. I met 3 other Elders in Dallas, and one of them was in my branch at the MTC, even though now I cant remember his name. Sis Richardson, he was in your district. One of them, Elder Lee, was heading to my mission, so we became comps for the time-being. It was sooo nice because once we got to the São Paulo airport we got friggin lost and since we couldnt really understand people, we would get the directions wrong on where to go. It was all fun though, and we were merrily sweating all the way. Once we finally made it to our gate, a member comes up to us and introduces himself to us. Turns out it´s the Stake President of where we would eventually end up. So that was cool. We finally made it to Londrina, as did our luggage (thank goodness) and found the Mission President, Presidente Leal, and the executive secretary, Elder Miller, and the treasury Elder, Elder Cavalheiro. Presidente Leal had to take off, so me and the three other Elders jumped in a cab and took off to the apartment. That was an experience. If you´ve ever ridden in a cab in Mexico, or somewhere similar you know what I´m talking about. This dude is just flying through the streets, and we dont stop for anything. I feel like I´m in a convoy in Iraq. The little horn is blaring at the cyclic rate. Heaven forbid if you´re a small animal. So here we are, there´s not an inch of empty space in this cab, flying through the streets of Londrina at the speed of Peugot. We finally arrive at the apartment, offload our stuff, and then we´re off to teach some lessons. Me and Elder Miller, who is also from Texas, Beaumont to be exact, went one way, and Elders Lee and Cavalheiro went the other. We taught...well, Elder Miller taught the lesson, and I was able to understand just about everything. The people here talk soooo much slower than those from Rio or São Paulo, so I actually have a chance now. We get back the apt, eat some Brasilian hotdogs, and go to immediately to trading ties. Ties are a very personal thing, and everybody has their individual taste. I cant stand striped ties. Every missionary I´ve ever seen has a striped tie. Well, that´s all Elder Miller has, but he actually had at least one that I liked, with this old school poly paisley, so I snatched those up pretty quick. He wanted a couple of my favorites, so he offered me a mini portuguese preach my gospel to sweeten the deal. I accepted, and now we are both happy. It was time for bed, so we went to sleep, which wasnt hard. I had really slept in about 2 days. I firmly believe that like cars, they design airplanes to be as uncomfortable as possible when you try to sleep. We´ve got two fans blowing, with interlocking courses of fire, so we´re always in the breeze. For the record, Elder Lee snores so fast, it sounds like he´s running a marathon in his sleep. All of the windows are open, there´s bugs everywhere, and I couldnt be happier. I´m finally in Brasil, trying to speak portuguese, and having the time of my life. I am so grateful to be here. A mission is such an amazing experience, and it´s such a privilage to work side by side with the Lord in His work.

Day 2

Not a whole lot happened today, because we were in the office most of the day. We did go apartment hunting though, so we got to get out and walk the streets for a little bit. We ate at this Brasilian buffet for lunch, which was awesome. I love Brasilian food. Presidente Leal came in, and we had interviews. He took care and spoke slowly, which I was grateful for, and I was able to understand most everything he said. Just the few minutes I´ve been able to spend with him are a blessing. He is such an amazing man, and I´m glad he´ll be my mission president for at least a few months. Next to our office is a little corner drugstore walgreens type thing. I needed some shaving cream in the worst way, so we went over there on the way back from lunch. I walk in, go the shaving section, and about die. Holy Moses riding a rocket this stuff is expensive. It was like, $22 reais for a little can. Forget the oil industry, the friggin shaving cream tycoons should be on the news. $22 reais is more or less $11 dollars. And the thing that really ticks me off, is that I had just bought a $2 econo-size can of gilette back in GA, but forgot to bring it. So, if you´re going to send a package, please send single or twin blade razors, shaving cream, and foot powder. It will be much appreciated.

Day 3
We went out with Elder Trindade, an Elder who goes home next week, and did some work. It was Elders Miller and Cavalheiros P-day, and Pres didnt want me and lee (hey that rhymed) to do nothing all day. So we get back in the taxi from hell and scream across Londrina. We arrive, only by the Grace of God, and start planning. We have about 10 people we are going to see, and we map out our day. The first person isnt home, so we go the next one, she´s home, and we teach her about the restoration. I started out the lesson, and suprised myself at how well I spoke. I´ve never spoken portuguese that good, everything just flowed. Lesson ended, and we move onto the next. It was a bright sunny day, and we were already sweating pretty good. We taught more people, walked everywhere, contacted people on the street, and I was just beaming. I love missionary work. And it helps that we were in the Antares area, which is known throughout the mission for people just accepting you without a second thought. By the time the day was over, we had taught 8 lessons, and walked about 8 miles. The last lesson we taught was a family that was going to be baptized on saturday. They are so awesome, and the kids just cracked me up. There was this little boy, about 2 years old, who was so fat everything jiggled when he ran. I could not stop laughing. All he had on were these blue briefs, and it was one of the funnier things I´ve seen since I´ve been out here. I love Brasil, I love the people, I love everything about it. I´m sorry to those that have served in other missions, but Londrina is where it´s at. This is the best mission in the world.


Well, it´s getting to be lunch time, and I´m morrendo com fome, so I´m going to head out.

Eu amo ya´ll,
Elder Standard


BTW, my P-day is wednesday now, and if anyone has Jarons Email, or can give him mine, please do so. I want to see how he´s doing.

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Pics and stuff

Hey everybody, here´s a few pics from my mission so far. The first one is me and Elder Trindade. He goes home next week, and since I dont have a comp yet (I will next week) they put us and Elder Lee (haha, get it- Elderly....) to together to go work. We taught about 8 lessons yesterday and walked about 8 miles. My feet are sore.

The next one is of a micro-van. These things are so cool. I will come back to Brasil and buy one of these when my mission is over.

The office that we go to sometimes for paperwork is right in the middle of town, so we see weird cars like this all the time. This is some kinda mini land rover.

This is the apartment for now, we´re moving out sometime this week, hopefully into a much bigger space. As it stands right now I have nowhere to hang my clothes. 0954 is another shot of the apartment.

And 0960 is just a pic of what I would look like with rapist glasses on. As soon as I find a pair that´s cheap I will buy some and wear them all around Brasil.

The last pic is of me and Elder Lee outside the mission office. I met Elder Lee in Dallas en route to here, so we´ve been quasi-comps since then.

I´ll send another email of my adventures here in a bit. Love ya´ll

Èlder Standard

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Recebeu meu visto

Finalmente! I recieved it last wednesday, and I'm finally leaving today. In a few hours actually. I'll be flying by myself again, which sucks, but it's whatever. I fly back to Dallas, so I'll get to stop in my home state for a little bit. After that then it's a 10 hour flight to Sao Paulo. Then, it's off to Curitiba, and then one last flight from Curitiba to Londrina. All in all it will be about 16 hours of flight, with about 5-6 hours of layover. I hate airports, I hate flying, and I'm going to get my fill today. Hopefully I dont have any problems, and all of my luggage makes it to Brasil with me. Just figured I'd give everyone a heads up of what's going on with me. Thanks for all of your emails so far, and if anyone has Jaron's email and can give it to me that would be great.

 

Eu amo ya'll,

Elder Standard

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Georgia...Georgia on my mind...

Oi, tudo bem! Well, I'm here in GA, and I have about 2 1/2 hours to email today, since it's me first day in country to email. President said it was cool. So, here I am. GA is awesome! I'm in the ATL north mission, which isnt in ATL at all though. My mission boundaries are about 5 minutes outside of ATL. Get this - I didnt have any clue who was going to pick me up. I didnt have a name, I didnt even have a phone number, just travel plans to go to GA at a certain time. But! I was not afraid, even after not having any money! 1 Nefi 3:7 became very real to me at that moment. I knew, with all of my heart, that everything would be ok, and that the Lord would provide. I know my Father is watching over me, as it says in D&C 84:80. I'm out here doing God's work, and my Father wouldnt suffer me to flounder about when this is His work. It will go forth, and no unhallowed hand will stop it from doing so. So, when I landed in GA, I got my luggage and stood outside. All of my cold weather gear was packed in the bottom of my kit, so it was a no-go in getting it out at that time. I waited, waited some more, and continued to wait. I figured I'd have to talk to somebody about the church before before my ride showed up. Eventually this little man came out side and sat next to me. He started reading a book. I turned to him and said "If you like to read I've got a book that will change your life". He started to laugh and we got into a conversation about how he was in the AirForce and all that jazz. During the conversation, he said "you know that Christ founded this country?" And I was like "Yeah! I do actually, in this book that I want to give you, it even talks about it! And how America is the promised land!" I showed him 2 Nefi 10 and continued to explain how this country got started. I felt like I was soooo close to giving him a Book of Mormon! But, he declined, I was devastated. Why wouldnt he have wanted to know how this country got started? And how this is the promised land? I figured that would have been a shoe-in. We continued to talk, and his ride showed up. No sooner than he left than did the assistants to the president show up and pick me up. I guess I called it right. Apparentely they had been waiting inside for about an hour for me, and I was waiting outside for an hour for them. We were seperated by 2 feet of wall. Go figure.

 

So, we get in the car and they take me to the apartment. I meet my new companion/s (there's four of us in the Apt) and we immediately go to a lesson. This was soooo awesome. And it's sooo much better than the MTC! Teaching real people, instead of other missionaries or members that volunteer to be taught. I shared my favorite scripture with her, which was really applicable at the moment for her - Isaiah 55:8-9. After we got done with lesson we went to go pick up a couple of Sister missionaries who were Brazilian. They were in a lesson and we waited quite awhile for them. Eventualmente they came out and we took them home. Small world in the church - One of them - Sister Santana, was in the same ward that my MTC teacher - Irma Tymoschenko was in in Sau Paulo, Brasil. It's so crazy. Well, we finally got home and I got to unpack a little - mostly my sleeping bag and a few other little things and we went straight to bed.

 

(sorry this is so long, alot happened)

 

The next day we went out tracting to an APT complex. We had the sisters with us (who are awesome BTW) We went to go check on an investigator but they werent home. So, we started knocking other doors. The first door me and my comp knocked the lady let us right in and we started teaching her. Turns out that she has a book of mormon already and has read about half of it and knows it's true! How awesome is this! Now, I know this dosent happen all the time, but the Lord has people prepared to hear the Gospel, and is just waiting for missionaries to go to work. So, we committed her to read 3 nefi 11, which is where the Savior visits the people in America after He is ressurrected. We are going back this sexta-feira (friday) to teach her some more. We left her house and started knocking doors again. We talked to everybody. There wasnt anybody that we didnt talk to. We had a dinner apointment, so we had to leave after a while. Dinner was at a members house, and she could cook - one, because she was from the south, two (and mostly) she had went to culinary school when she was younger. We had Spaghetti, which tasted just like Mom's. It was sooooo awesome, especially after eating the MTC food forever....

 

Saturday rolled around and we were supposed to go to a baptism. Me and Elder Rasmuson (my comp) and the Sisters were supposed to bear our tesimonies at the baptism. It was a portuguese family, and almost everybody there spoke portuguese. Well, since my portugeuse is still aweful, I had to fill in some of my testimony with english. Mas, tudo bem. After that baptism we had Brazilian food for refreshments and I about died. I was heaven. Nao posso esperar a ir a Brasil porque da comida la. I took some pictures of the food, but I have no way of uploading them right now (I forgot the cord, sorry....)

 

Finalmente - Domingo (sunday)

 

We go to church, and this ward is awesome, it reminds me alot of my homeward of Tomball. Everybody was so nice and willing to help with anything. We have a place to eat every night this semana. We had three dinner apointments after church, and we were about to die after the second one. I didnt know I could eat that much. After the members we went to a portuguese lesson with the Sisters. Now, I dont understand portuguese yet, and everybody talks soooo fast. The feeling I had is equal to watching a talk show on mute. You can kinda get the idea of what's going on, but you have no clue as to the specifics. Well, it came to my turn to say something, and I was supposed to speak about why I'm a member. You know it's your turn when the room goes silent and everybody looks at you. I stumbled through my shpeel and bore my testimony. Apparentely whatever I said was not too far off. He committed to go to church next sunday and to read the BOM.

 

And, today is monday, which is P-day. We are going bowling here in a few minutes, so I've gotta go. Just wanted to update everyone on what's going on with me. I know the true gospel of Jesus Cristo is restored on the earth again, and I am so grateful to my Heavenly Father for once more extending His arm to His children so we can follow the correct steps and return to live with Him again. I am so grateful to be in Georgia, and I hope I'm here for at least a couple of weeks. I already love the people and I've only been here 4 days. Eu sou grato por este oportunidade a servir aqui.

 

Ate Logo,

Elder Standard

 

 

 

PS - If anyone has Presidente Bertasso's email and could remember to send it to me would be the coolest person on earth. Besides me...

PPS - Irmao Sanders, if you can get me Irma Tymoschenko's email tambem que estaria otimo tambem.

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Como Vou!

Yeah, I know, it's been a few months since I last checked in, but I finally remembered how to access this thing via email. Well, I'm still here in Provo, waiting for my visa. All of my district recieved theirs a couple of weeks ago, and then I got put into a triple with some other Elders who had the same thing happen to them. One of them got reassigned a few days later to Billings, Montana, and he had the same amount of weeks as I did. So, I could go either way, either to Brazil, or somewhere else depending on what the Lord wants to do with me. I'll trust in Him though, as He can see things I cant. Well, I should be able to update this thing pretty regular now, so keep checking in. There's been some amazing things happen in the last 2 months, and I dont have time to write them all. Ate Logo, Elder Standard

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