Happy Thankgiving from Brazil

Happy Thanksgiving from Bryan in Brazil.
Pics...End of a long day. Lucky. Elder Schoen eating Chu chu.



First things first, i gotta give shout outs to várias pessoas...
Elder Walton: Received your letter...will send one next week
Katrine: Got your email! will send a recap of that other letter in the next
Jason Olmstead: heart
Daniel Stewart: Yeah boyyyyyyyyyyy (i forgot the secret code, so i hope you get this)

So, mom, im glad you are getting all ready for thanksgiving. I really wish i could be there. However, Elder Schoen and I will be celebrating at Rosangelas house with her family...has two benefits..we get food and they arent members, so more friendship! It should be way fun.

I dont know what is going on with the emails...you know that i am not the biggest fan of myldsmail.net.

Dont worry about me, my health is perfect right now and things are going great..im just suuuuper tired as it has been a long day and i havent been able to have sufficient sleep for a few days.

And the dogs seem like it would be all right...i liked the first one...but it is hard to know without seeing their personalities.

Onnnnnnnnnnnnnn to the week

So, this past week has a few big highlights. The first...sweet new people. We have found a couple awesome families this past week that seem super excited..one even accepted baptismal dates. I just want to be able to stock the cupboard of awesome investigators as transfers are next week, and the chances arent the greatest for me to stay...but there is hope! The bishop asked me to give him the presidents phone number so that he could call him to request that i stay longer in Sao Roque...so that is super cool! A huge compliment. Means that he thinks that we are doing great work and wants me to stay...just cool. Also, i heard that all the members have been peskering him recently to do something so that i stay for a little bit longer as well. But...who knows, i have been here for almost 7 months (5 transfers), i have 2 transfers with E. Schoen, and who knows.

Second big thing....Baptismal interviews! So, we did a division this week so that Antonio, Josefa, and Filipe could have their interviews for their baptism this weekend. Long story short, they passed! They are super excited for it and super motivated to be baptized, stay strong in the gospel, and enter the temple. They will be baptized on sunday right after the sacrament meeting. This family has come a long long way...and it all started with patience, perserverance, and a trip to the temple.

Third thing....speaking of temple, we went today! It was awesome, as usual. To do it we went to Sorocaba last night to sleep at the zone leaders hosue. We ended up getting super wet as it was pouring cats and dogs, and things were just nuts. We got to the temple and we had a very spiritual experience. I went in fasting and i received the answer to a question that i have been wrestling with over the past few weeks. The full account is in another email, as i already sent it and i am too lazy to type it out again (I think I need permission from Bryan before I put this in the blog - pretty interesting news!). Anyways, we ended up taking the bus back to sorocaba, waiting there for our bus to sao roque, and we got here in the area at 630 pm...super late. But, we are able to write
Love ya

Please send Christmas Cards:)

First photo is with Elder Richard G. Scott

Second photo is me playing at the local fountain

Give Jesse a high five and a congrats for me! Crazy that he is coming home! Well, another 10 months for me!

Thanks Bishop Garrick for the updates!

Anyways, thanks for the update on the Mommom's Memorial service. I'm glad that it all went so well and would have liked to have been there too. I can't believe my cousin, Adam is about to graduate college. Just crazy! But I am happy that it was such a good experience. It made me extra happy to read about the family, and also that no one is going to get married until I get home!

Oh, and remember, I am getting on a different time (according to you guys). Now, instead of it being 12 when i get on, it is 10 (because of daylight savings). Oh well. (Lately Bry's emails are taking up to 9 hours to get here)

Thanks for the email from Bishop Garrick, I like him a lot. He was always a great leader to me, and I am very happy that he is following the blog so closely.

Also, a quick shot out to David Cruz!
E aÍ cara! Nao acredito que ta ficando gordo! Tem que fazer acadamia mesmo....como que voce vai arranjar as moças de disney pra mim quando eu for pra sua casa ano que vem! Lol, just kidding dawg. Mas sim, fiquei feliz por ter recebido sua email. Acredita que ainda estou em Sao Roque?! Acho que vou morrer aqui no interiorzâo! Mas, eu gosto muito daqui e tambem do meu filho, a obra ta bom demais.
Tchau!

Also, to Bethanie...Thanks for the email! I can't wait to get your letter!

Onnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn to the week

So, this past week has been pretty rushed. We had zone conference, and service projects, and traveling, and new people, and just tons of work. The most eventful thing this week was that i got to go to a foot doctor! I have been diagnosed with a bad case of trench foot....
just kidding.
Actually, i just had a light case of an ingrowned toenail. The lady fixed it up pretty quick, and then continued to give me a pretty good foot treatment...I think I might just pretend to have a bad toenail again just so I can go back. But yeah, it was fun. Also, In the past week we have talked in english schools, helped people move their house, painted walls, washed dishes, all sorts of good service projects.
As far as the work goes, we have found some sweet people recently. I am most excited about one family in particular. They are super open about everything, very accepting, plus they are the owners of the Lanhouse that we use! Maybe the mishies will get free internet if we baptize them! Haha, wouldn't that be cool.

Also, we are using this week really to get people ready for their baptismal interviews next week. I am super excited for some of these people, especially one family in particular (that went to the temple with us). Basically all is going pretty awesomely here. One thing that is especially cool, the people in the ward like me! Since I already have been here for 5 transfers, it hasnt been looking good for me to stay here one more with Elder Schoen. However, a lot of members have been begging the bishop to call the Mission President to request that I stay for a bit longer! How cool is that? Hopefully it works out, it would be super annoying to be transferred out of here right before Christmas. Super Annoying.

Well, thats about all the news that I can come up with for now. I guess the other interesting side to the experience is just that this ward is so full of drama...seriously, its like Days of our Lives...soap opera city. Everybody is connected to somebody else and weird love tales slash work stuff slash just randomness. But, I love it here.

Miss ya tons!

Increase the Peace

Made My Mission Worth It...

Terceiro: story book sky
Primeiro: Alexandre and his family at the baptism. Mom is active member, dad is a recent convert who refuses to stop smoking, brother and sister arent members.
Segundo: The five of us, the three baptizees and Elder Schoen and I

Well, glad to hear that the art workshop in Seattle went well! So the Goeslings are all doing great? Tell Talia that I say hi too. I hope you had a fun and safe drive home! I am completely forgetting that things are starting to get icey up there, as the sun is really starting to bake. Go Brasil!

Super cool that you are getting in touch with some of your old friends.

Anyways, onnnnnnnnnn to the week.

So, this week has been pretty awesome. To start things off, we had an amazing baptism on saturday, of three rapazes. It was a super cool event with lots of people there and lots of good feelings. I am super excited about all three, more priesthood for the ward! Woot! Can you believe that there are some missionaries go their entire missions without baptizing priesthood? It just is tougher, women have more open hearts i guess. Anyways, about them...their names are Lucas, Rodrigo and Alexandre. Lucas and Rodrigo are brothers, they are 12 and 13 years old, and live in pretty poor conditions. Their dad is a recent convert/less active, but they have been getting super excited about the church recently. I really think the main difference with them was leaving The Other Side of Heaven with them to watch. Now they are stoked to be missionaries...already they teach people how to pray whenever we go over there. It was cool. Now we need to get their mom. Also, the other baptism is the one that i am most excited for. His name is Alexandre, is 26 years old, is divorced, and has one son (but is living with his ex wife down in Floripa). So, this guy has changed a ton...when i started teaching him about 6 months ago, he had problems with everything, chastity, word of wisdom, you name it. However, it just goes to chow the miraculous power of Christ. He has stopped all of these things, and is super excited to stay strong in the church. His primary motivation is to be able to be the type of father that his son needs, to be worthy to take care of his son. It has been super cool to see his change. This guy has basically made my mission worth it.

After that, we had an awesome sunday, with tons of people at church. We got some of our other investigators to go, and we had another miracle! Almost forgot. So, remember that family that we took to São Paulo to see the temple? Well, they have all been pretty excited to get into the church. The husband (Antonio) and the son (Felipe) have been coming every week since. However, the wife (Josefa) was working every sunday. So, without 2 sundays at church, people cant be baptized, so she has been working super hard to try to change her schedule, to trade with people, to make stuff happen so that the family could get baptized. Just when it looked like we were going to have to move their baptism date to december, her employer randomly offered her a different schedule! HALLELUJAH! It was awesome. She went to church, loved it, and is going to be able to come every week now. Another family that has basically made my mission worth it.

We found some other cool new people, and we went to sorocaba to play soccer and eat churrasco (brazi bbq) today. Gosh, my neck is pretty burned haha. But, all is well.

Elder Bry

ps. :) i am starving for some home news/gossip, everyone please send me some via my Mom at cbriggsdesigns@yahoo.com and she'll forward it to me.

Moon Lit Favela

pics...moon lit favela
Halloween (E. Schoen and I celebrated halloween by going out as each other! I wore his nametag and he wore mine. Unfortunately, we didnt get to pig out on candy as we were fasting :( first time in his life haha. This kid is ruining me, im actually developing a sweet tooth.)

Some shout outs to
Paige sent you a letter today!
Grandmother sent you a letter today!

Onnnnnn to the week
Well, this past week has been AWESOMe...but super tiring. We having been walking and working like bandits. It all started last thursday when we had a service project with a less active. We got to carry buckets of sand up a huge set of stairs so that they could do some house stuff. It was fun, but definitely rough.

Since then, we have been teaching lots of the awesome people, and seeing the individual miracles in peoples lives. For example, one person, Heloise, is making HUGE progress. She should get baptized next week. She has stopped smoking, drinking, drinking coffee, and went to church this week and said that she had never felt so good in her life! Then, when the opposition started throwing stuff at her for her to give up, she held on, said her prayers, and received amazing answers from the book of mormon. Then, she used her new found strength and faith to help her ex hsuband also receive answers to his prayers and reconstruct his broken trust in the Lord. She rocks.

Also, if all goes well, we should have a few dunkings this weekend. The coolest thing happened sunday. Tons of people went to church, but even better, the younger brother of another kid that we were preparing for baptism. At the end of the church meeting, he came up and asked "can i be baptized with my brother this saturday?" Elder Schoen and I exchanged glances and shouted Of course! It was sick.

Miracles just keep happening. Thats all i can really say. I love the mission, i love the gospel, and i love Brasil. keep praying for me! it is working.


glad to hear that caryn is doing so well, make sure she knows that a letter is coming her way! I sent it recently.