Well, its out with the old and in with the new this week. We found out this morning that Elder Abdo, my beloved companion and father (I am technically his Son, because He trained me) Will be leaving, for who knows where.
I will be left alone in the giant city of Torres, to try to teach my next companion everything there is to know, about our investigators, and the general layout. I am a little scared because I still don't know the city very good; the mazy, narrow, cobble stone streets just arnet easy for a small town Idaho boy to learn, but we'll see what happens. But, on the other hand, I am really excited, because it gives me one more chance to excel, learn and do a little better. I have the chance to teach my new companion what I want to; introduce him to the people I want to, etc. I have some pretty good ideas to further the missionary work, but I am still a junior, so it probably will be kind of awkward. We'll see what happens. For the past week he has been saying goodbye to all the members, and investigators, getting and giving addresses and preparing to leave, but it wasn't until this morning that we knew for certain. He is excited and ready to move on. In his words, "I am out of ideas for this city, its time to pass it on to someone else"
So, the plan is this, tomorrow morning, at 8 we will get on the bus bound for Osorio, where I will get off and stay with Elder Cummock, whom arrived with me at the CTM. From there, Elder Abdo and the companion of Elder Cummock will go on to Porto Alegre. Elder Cummock and our new companions will find each other, and ride the bus back to Osorio. This way we will save a little bit of money. I am excited to see elder cummock, I became good friends with him in the CTM. I am a little afraid, and curious to speak Portuguese with him, and to see how much he has learned. Out of all the people in my old district in the CTM he picked up the language the fastest and most natural.
Right now, I am in the Ian House, there are these three boys that are about the same age as Joshua, Micah and Ben. And they are acting about as stupid to. A couple of times, just for fun I have said---shut up you kids, in English, but of course they don't understand. But they are playing one of those online computer games, and are yelling from clear across the room at each other. Brother, why do kids that age have such freaking loud voices.
Overall this week has been and excellent week. It went as follows:
Wednesday: Every Wednesday we have lunch with the member that has an English school. He is the most kicked back, easy going guy I have ever met (he takes his shoes off in sacrament and stretches out) and it's probably a good thing that he is easy going to, because I broke his roof. At that moment, I felt like the biggest CITY SLICKER in my entire life. He has a little pen of chickens. Baby chickens were mixed in with the big ones, he asked me to try to catch the babies. I did, then he wanted some of the bigger ones to clip there wings. While I was in the process of catching them he was standing in the door way of the pen. It just so happened that he left just a big enough crack in the door to let one stupid chicken escape. It escaped and took advantage of its unclipped wings---up to the top of his old, rickety house. I kind of felt at fault, because it was I that was to clumsy to catch a simple chicken, so I volunteered to ascend to the roof to try to chase down the chicken. I scampered up, took one step and there was nothing, well, the sound of breaking fiberglass, and my foot going through, but other than that just air. No harm done to me, or my clothes, but, he had to buy 2 new pieces of fiberglass---brother, where am I from, Utah?
Thursday: Thursday is always the day that I speak a bunch of English, because we have our district meeting, and Sister Baird and I don't speak Portuguese very well, so it is always a temptation. But we had a great lesson (given by my comp) about how Satan hunts like an Eskimo. First, he digs a hole in the snow, and then he pours blood around the hole. He buries a knife, with the blade sticking up coated with blood. The wolves come, and start eating the snow around the hole. It is mixed in with the snow, so there tongue goes numb. But blood is yummy eh? They get to the knife, lick the blood off----now they have warm blood, their own! So they keep licking and licking, until they commit suicide. Do we ever let Satan do this with temptation? For lunch that day, the Bairds invited some visiting members from Canella (2 hours away) a young couple, like Rhett and Lisey, but minus the kids, (almost, shes pregnant) young members of the church are so sharp down here, they have a good spirit about them. It turns out that 4 years ago, they were living out of their car---now, they have a vacation home here in Torres (I think his occupation is in computers.)
We always eat well there. Hot bread, fillet Mion and a baked potato (the meat is WAY cheap here) afterwards, elder baird had been promising us that he would treat us to some ice-cream, so all of us went down the street to a walk-in ice-cream buffet parlor, with 100 different flavors, I ate half a kilo.
Friday: The day of the Baptism! Finally! And, even though it threatened to rain Thursday and Friday, we weren't going to let it stop us from baptizing. So we arranged (much to my disdain) to have the baptism in the capesca (caça/pesca clube) or hunting and fishing club, don't ask me why they have a hunting club here. There isn't a thing to hunt here, except little tweedy birds… But anyway, they have a swimming pool, and were willing to let us use it. So, at 7:30, 3 members from the branch, the bairds, Zilco and Neli (Neli was baptized, zilco will, eventually) and us. It was very fast and very simple, Elder Abdo had the privilege. The whole thing was over in 30 minutes, but it was very spiritual, and fulfilling. If it had been in the ocean, I would have gotten to go in the water, to be a witness, but because it was in the swimming pool, I had a good view from the side.
Afterward, we went to the church, introduced her to Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and various other books.
Saturday: We went to Orio Do Sol to eat lunch at Irmão João and Marlis house. It is an hour away, on the bumpiest bus there ever was, but I still managed to get a little sleep. We arrived 1 hour early, so we just sat and talked, about missionary work, their life, etc. They have adopted 3 grandkids, because there parents are drugies. We also visited this new family that we found, 1 Bolivian named German, who married a Brazilian and now has 3 kids. They are a really neat family. Elder Abdo said when we left "They will be baptized" Why I asked? "Because they have an open heart" he said. SO we will see. They weren't in church yesterday. I am a little afraid that all they want is a friendship and nothing else. We ate hotdogs at there house (pretty Brazilian eh?)
Sunday: Sunday was the best day of the week, in my opinion. The thing that makes me the most happy is when I can speak the language, and I could yesterday. As part of the "Year of the Missionary" that I talked about last week, Elder Abdo and I gave talks, so I spent basically every morning this week preparing a killer talk about missionary work. I wrote it in English, but am proud because I translated it into portugues without any help. Two minutes before we arrived to the church, Elder Abdo "suddenly" remembered to tell me that the 2nd councilor of the mission and the secretary would be there. I became pretty nervous, not only for the talk, but for the lesson.
But it turned out, the spirit pulled through for me, and I gave an excellent lesson on the importance of Prayer, and how we should not be like the people of the Ramimptum. I think everyone understood me, at least afterwards, the counselors families said "."
We also confirmed Neli´. Irmão Marciano, the councilor in the branch confirmed her, she cried and cried, and afterwards, bore her short, but from the heart testimony. Aline and Terizinha came to church yesterday too.
I was also very happy with how my talk went. The year of the Missionary is officially underway. It is the month of fasting and prayer. Our goal is to have 9 baptisms at the end of the year, we already have 1 (nelí) I talked about Doctrine and Covenants 65, and how the stone has been cut out of the mountain without hands, but it is WITH hands that it will roll forth throughout the whole world. I then gave the example of here in Brazil. James E Faust and the first missionaries to arrive here, 70 years ago only had 3 or 4 baptisms each year. But in 2007 there were nearly 30,000 baptisms here. The stone is officially rolling forth.
I talked about how we need to all lift were we stand (Pres Uckdorf Priesthood) and every member become a missionary (David O Mackay) I gave the statistics. There are 7 billion people in the world and 14 million missionaries. So, 1 member for every 5000 people in the world. We easily associate with this many people in a life time---and according to a story, about a person that was attacked by a bandit, and the bandit was converted, I illustrated how each one of us have a light, radiance about us, which can let us be a missionary in and of itself.
So the week was good. Pray that my new companion will not be a slacker, I will know in 24 hours
I WILL SEND SOME MORE PICTURES TOMORROW OF THE BEAUTIFUL SCENERY AQUI. I FORGOT MY CAMERA TODAY, SO WILL DO IT TOMORROW.
Love you all!
Jacob
