Wednesday, February 2, 2011

January 31, 20100

Tudo bem!? It sounds like things are pretty action packed at home, but its okay cuz its super action packed out here. I hope they get the VISA deal worked out soon, cuz i wanna get down there so bad and start improving my portuguese!! I dont get language study that often here, so I try to squeeze it in before bed and early mornings. Dang, Gary is sick again!!! What the heck, that dog is always sick... What's he sick with? So you're liking jesus the christ eh?? Maybe when i get to brazil i'll buy one in portuguese and read it. I hear its got some super deep doctrine in it, and when he was writing it he had a special room in the temple to write it in. So yeah, this week was pretty action packed. I went on exchanges to south philly, and boy is it GHETTO!!!! We were trackting and i knocked on the door and the woman threatend to get her shotgun out. She was nice. But yeah, i figured out i hate trackting so bad! I'd rather just teach lessons, but i guess you have to find people before you teach em. We're really lucky in this area where we dont tract at all. We just find all investigators through the family members. Africans have tons of family members here, and we find new people at their houses every day. Somthing cool that happend is that I set up a return appointment in spanish! I knew barely enough to be able to set one up. The portuguese sentance structure helps. Really similar. This week I gave my first blessing in the mission field too. It was sweet. We went on more exchanges this week to West Chester, and it was a Blizzard! Man, it was snowing soooo hard and we got like 2 feet of snow! The best thing is, that we were tracting the WHOLE TIME! We had like 3 pounds of snow on our clothes. Fun fun! This week was a bad week of african food. Man, I dont even know what the stuff i'm eating even is!! Mystery meat is all i can say... with rice and lots and lots of peppers. I just have to choke it down while i gag, while saying "mmmm this is.... goooood..." to please the africans. They get so happy when we eat their food. I'm so sick of fish gravy, kasava leaf, and pumpkin paste!! We did though, eat some wayyy good doughnuts from the africans. They taught us how to make them last night! This week we were teaching a family about loving one another, because they are ALWAYS fighting. During the lesson, the mom got mad at her son and threw her shoe at him. I'm glad they were applying the things we were teaching them. Jeez.... Man, if child services saw these houses we go to, the kids would be out of there in a heartbeat. The houses are really dirty and not sanitary at all. The other day, we saw some babies drinking out of the toilett and eating spaghetti out of the garbage. Its super sad. It doesnt mean anything to the African culture though. When the kids are bad they put hot peppers in their mouth. So transfers were today and i'm staying in Darby, so i'm glad. Also, I talked to the missionary who is serving in the area where i taught the Brazilians, and I found out they have a baptisimal date!!! Its crazy how I was put there at that moment to teach them the gospel in portuguese, and it took them to the path of baptism. Big blessing. Well, not much else to say. No word on my visa, still waiting. Have an awesome week! I love you!!!
 Matt

January 24, 2011

Well I'm glad someone is enjoying nice weather, because over here its a freezer!! It is so cold here it's rediculous. Humid cold too. Right when you step outside it immediatly sucks out all heat from your body. It sucks! But anyways... This week was another week of african food pounding. Even though you had to eat indian food for ashlee's bday, just be greatful that you don't have to pound some African food. You don't know what fish heads and goat meat can do to your systems! I think my guts are turned to stone now, because i'm starting to not get sick after. If the food they give us stains a metal spoon, and the bowl, then i can only imagine what it does to my stomache! This week i looked into the pot of food from which my bowl was made out of, and i saw a goat jaw bone. Mmmmm. But on the bright side, I actually found some good African food! They make these homemade deepfried doughnut things that are actually super good! Good african food.... who would've known?? Haha. Transfers are next monday, that will be interesting! I think they'll keep me here in Darby. I think my visa should come within a month so we'll see. Something crazy that happend this week is that i was walking outside to an appointment with Elder Lake, because we went on exchanges and Elder Kay had the car, and we see this big white dog with dreadlocks running around across the street. We were laughing cuz it was funny seeing a dog with dreadlocks, because you just dont see it every day. As soon as we made the comment "its gunna eat us" it seemed as though the dog heard us, and started running and barking at us! It was scary!!! haha that thing was gunna totally kill us! I ran behind a bunch of wood pallets, and Elder Lake ran the other way. Luckily, he chased Elder Lake and not me, so Elder Lake jumped on top of this random car and the dog was barking and growling at him. It was scary but i was laughing at the same time. The dog looked away for a second and me and Elder Lake just took off! We got away, so its all good haha. So we had 2 Baptisms scheduled yesterday, but they both got scared and backed out saturday night. It was super frustrating, but i want them to be ready for this when they feel ready, so i was okay. We have a ton of investigators with a baptisimal date, so next transfer we should be busy with baptisms. Something really neat happend this week. I think I found out the reason why i'm supposed to be in Philadelphia right now. So I went on exchanges to a place called Norristown this week, and me and a missionary named Elder North working together. I asked him if there were any people that spoke portuguese in the area, and he said there was an old investigator that they havent heard from in a while that was from Brazil. So later that night we went to their house, and Elder North knocked on the door and a man answered. Elder North asked if we could share a message with him, but the guy said "not tonight, maybe next friday". But then, i went up to the guy and started speaking Portuguese with him and i asked him if we could come in and share a message with him. He let us right in!! It was so cool. I was speaking portuguese with him and his girlfriend the whole time! I taught them about the restoration and the book of mormon all in Portuguese. The guy hardly knew english, and his girlfriend didnt know any at all, so i was just speaking Portuguese the whole time! They said i spoke really good for only knowing it for a couple of months. They loved it! We had an amazing lesson and I was so happy to get the opportunity to share the gospel in different tounges. If i didn't know portuguese, then they wouldn't have been comfortable to let us in the door in the first place, so i believe I was placed there for a reason. Hopefully they progress well and will embrace the gospel. They liked the lesson and the scripture i shared with them (moroni 10: 3-5). Amazing week with amazing people. I love the people out here! It will be sad to leave them. But... yeah. Florida huh?? That should be fun! Geez you have Florida and hawaii coming up. Lucky! You gotta save for Brazil man!! Well, keep working hard and have a great week. Love you!!!

Matt