The work never stops...

Pics

Newbies receiving their trainers

On Division in Barueri with Elder Mason & Elder Sena

Last weeks letter...(Mom blogger was out of town, sorry for the delay)
It was awsome calling home on Mother's Day, I love calling home (note, Bryan can only call home for 1 hour on Mother's Day and Christmas Day, so we have only talked to him 4 times during these 2 years) It is so weird to call home, it felt completely normal. I don't think I have completely realized that it is my last call home from Brazil before I home home. So strange. My life is that of a missionary now. That's it. It's is going to be awesome to come home, but I still have no idea how I am really going to react to returning. I'm stoked, it's going to be awesome. It is so wierd that I will be a 21 year old sophomore - just like my sister and her friends.

onnnnnnnnnnnto the week.

Things have been pretty hectic in the past week. Lot's of things happening every day. We did 3 divisions, had the call home on Sunday, visited the newbies (new missionaries) at the CTM (Mission training center), did some more trainings, emergency transfers, had transfers this morning, what a crazy week.

Our three divisions last week were in 3 places called Pirituba, Osasco, and Barueri. It went pretty welll. All Three nights we slept at the Pirituba house with Elder Fabian and Elder Little. It was fun, they are part of Elder Parsons' group. The days in the three areas all went pretty well. We spent most of the days contacting addresses gained from the street contacts and talking to people in the street. We had some success in all of them, finding some awesome new people that really want to know the truth of the Restored Gospel. It was fun. One really cool experience that we had was doing division with the zone leaders in Osasco. That stake has organized a cool english class system. Three times a week, the church has free english classes (and super well done) for anyone who would like to participate. There are over 400 students (from 8 years old to 80) going to the church regularly for these classes. The Elders take advantage of the opportunity and speak English with the students and also are able to get some addresses to visit and teach. Way cool. However the rest of the day was rough because of a sudden and torrential brazilian rainstorm that went into the night. The weather is starting to get colder here.

As for the newbies, it has been a lot of fun. It was so cool to go to the CTM to meet them all and bring them up to speed on the mission. We talked to theme about the mission rules, mission culture, and how to invite people to baptism. It was a great group with 5 American Elders, 3 Brazilian Elders, and one American Sister. We went there the next day to get them and they had an exciting day learning other rules and just waiting to meet their trainers this morning.

Also, another interesting thing that happened was planning transfers. The way it works is we have a couple meetings and use the Mission President's picture/area board to make the changes. Things are inspired by the President of changes to be made. He also wants our suggestions, and the suggestions offered by the zone leaders. Then, when it is all finished, we called Monday night to let everyone know if they are transferred or not and where they are going. Over the next day, however, a couple emergencies came up and we had to make a couple changes. One, which was good, was an elder that wanted to give up on the mission suddenly decided he wanted to stay after all. We then had to arrange things to find a spot for him. Then everyone arrived here at the office this morning at about nine am to meet their new companion and leave. Also at the same time, we had a new training that we made for the new trainers, and showed them the new missionaries and got them paired up. It's all very exciting and stressful. I am completely wiped out right now, just ready to sleep. However, we are leaving tonight to go out and do some more divisions. The work never stops.

Bry