Let's Eat Pasta

 All right! *cracks knuckles* Let's do this. 

The District!

Tuesday:

We had a lesson with a new guy, Algace, and it went AMAZING. It might have been the best lesson we ever taught. He was asking questions and engaging. It ended with him agreeing to read the Book of Mormon and pray about whether it's true. Then, immediately after, we had a lesson with Devanir. The lesson was another great one. It lasted about an hour. We covered the plan of salvation, the restoration, and the gospel of Jesus Christ. He was so interested, and said he wanted to come to our church. He pointed out that our church was different from others; it has actual doctrine to learn. We asked when he gets out of the hospital and... he got out two days earlier!!! Which means we can drop off a Book of Mormon. We are so excited to talk to him more. He loved the lesson, and said he believes there is more that God has prepared us to learn. We spoke about baptism and covenants as well. From there, we went straight to get flu shots, and that was the day. 

Wednesday:

When we got back, we had a lesson with Augosto, and it also went great. We asked him about his experience reading and praying about the Book of Mormon. He told us that his faith was growing, that he felt better spiritually, and that he found himself drawing closer to God in his desires. It was an awesome experience, and we invited him to attend church. He wasn't able this week but wanted to next week. After that lesson, we went to the Hortas to get back a plate we had given them and drop off more cookies. We left with a bag of apples, peaches, two cases of wet wipes, two slices of cake, a guitar, and our plate. They are just the best; there is no other way to put it. We have a hard time getting in contact with the members over here, but when we do, it's such a fulfilling experience. From there we went to a food kitchen to offer service for a couple hours. It was there that I got Bible bashed for the first time haha. An older guy was talking to me while I filled bags. He asked why I was there, and I responded I was on a mission for my church. He was impressed and asked what church. I responded "The Church of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints"... "some people call us mormons." He wasn't that happy anymore, and he wanted us to go with

Cookie Grease stains on my journal.
Whoops!

him to his church. I asked for his number so I could get the address, and he said he would just show me. He gave us the most Bostonian directions you've ever heard of. *in Boston accent, "All right, so what you're gonna want to do is take this street right here; this is called main street. And you're gonna drive it that way until you get to a stoplight and turn right. From there you'll follow the road until you see an old building with a sign called the foundry. If you get to the train station you've gone too far." After that, he left us alone to go back to doing service. All in all an interesting experience. When we got home around 3 hours later, we ate some of the peaches the Hortas gave to us. They were AMAZING. I walked around the apartment with a peach in each hand, cause ya, I'm living the high life. After that we had some time to exercise, so I asked Elder Bodily I'd he wanted to do it with me. He responded "Naw, I'm just gonna go eat pasta." We both started laughing just cause he said it completely unironically. And that was our day. 

Thursday: 

I know what you're thinking, weekly planning. Actually, no. Not at all this week in fact. We never ended up having time. What we did do is give the Haitian Creole elders our car. They share one with the Zone Leaders but can't always use it. So they always need us to drive down, pick them up, drive home, then give them the keys. We finally got home and were gonna call Devanir when the fire alarm went off! It was nothing, but 20 minutes later we got back and the unthinkable happened, it didn't ring. Just went straight to unavailable. This is what happens when you're blocked, so we were kinda sad. During our last lesson I had a STRONG prompting to ask for his address to write it down, but ignored it because I didn't want to interrupt Elder Bodily. He has a brother-in-law who is a preacher for another church. We are afraid he made Devanir block us, as that's something that happens. We found out later when we tried to call on a different phone that it did the same thing, which means that actually his phone is probably just dead. We hope we can get back in touch with him. 

Friday:

100 days as a missionary! 

Started off with District Leader council, which is where the District leaders in our zone meet with the zone leaders to coordinate the efforts in our areas. From there, we went to district council to relay the information back to our district.  After that we had a call with Deborah. When we called and said it was the missionaries, she immediately hung up. That stung a lot; I can't lie. We spend so much time preparing and talking about how we can help each person, praying about it as well. And we've been building a relationship with her for months. Then out of nowhere, she starts ignoring us the past couple weeks. It's a part of the missionary experience though, patience and faith. 

Saturday:

Naturally, I woke up and made cookie dough, because why wouldn't I. We then had a lesson with a member named Ana Maria, which I'm only bringing up, because it's so hard to get in touch with members; so it's always exciting. From there we had a normal day, until our devotional on facebook with Brad Wilcox. It was AWESOME! I learned a lot about my own life, and how I can be a better missionary. Anyone who wants to watch it is welcome to, it's on my Facebook profile. From there, we had an interested woman that we called to see if she wanted to meet. She said she was busy, as her mother was having an operation on Monday, and she had to take care of her at home. That's when we thought of a good idea for that cookie dough, haha. So we brought a plate of 15ish cookies to her house and apparently they liked them cause they asked for the recipe. The only problem is that I do not know how to convert recipes from English to Portuguese, haha. It's a lot harder than you'd think. 

Sunday: 

Woke up with two referrals for interested people! However one of them spoke English, and the other one lived in New Hampshire so we sent their information to the appropriate missionaries. To this day, out of the dozen or so referrals I have received, they've all been for other areas, haha. Sunday we had normal church services, and ended with a devotional by Elder and Sister Rasband. After that we got a text from the Assistant Missionaries that our Districts Pday, the day once a transfer that we are allowed to hang out in person other than district council, was gonna be Monday. We were pumped, but had to figure out what to do. Planning transportation and activities was a bit of a chore, but we figured it out.

Monday: 

And here we are, district p day. We went to the park, ate, and walked around. From there we went to a bowling alley for a bit and just talked and got to know each other. It was great, and a much needed chance to get some fresh air haha. 

I'm a chef but I'm not a baker. Left them in the oven for 2 hours. It's not chocolate. 

Elder Bodily and I out for a walk at night. Not a bad view!

What are the odds

 Tuesday:

So we started off the day as normal, with planning, then we decided to make some phone calls. While it was dialing, I picked up 5 die and rolled them and then got psyched put of my mind when I saw the results. I rolled 5 1's. Which, according to my math, has a .012655 percent chance of occurring. So in other words, this week was gonna be a special one. And boy oh boy, it was. To start off, we took the car in at 11 to get the tires switched out. We got there at 12 and were told it was gonna be about 5 hours before they finished... So, we had a lesson with Augosto on a picnic bench and did a lot of calling and online work. The lesson with Augosto went great! We already teach him with just audio calls, so it wasn't a big deal that we were outside. He's also great at keeping commitments and is always really engaged in the conversation. We prayed and decided the best way we could help Deborah F, but that lesson ended up being canceled. We got our car about 5:30 and were home by 6:30. That's when Elder Bodily and I had a real lesson in patience. We teach English classes. Last week, the class started late at 7:30; so we then decided to leave all the other classes until that time since that's when people show up. But no one showed up at the class, and at 8:15 the mother of the family said that our lesson was at 8:15, and without getting into too much detail was super condescending and rude to people who were trying to help her speak English. At that point, I just got on my knees and said a prayer to have patience and feel Christ's love for this woman. And after that it was like a switch in my brain; I couldn't feel any anger. We need to learn to rely on Christ for our problems. If we aren't rooting our actions in Him, we will never be able to become the people we strive to be. Anyways, after that we had a call with the Sisters. Elder Bodily is district leader, and they had asked that we call them now and then to check up on them. This particular day, we just complained and moaned about how we were stuck in the middle of no where all day and then a lady was rude to us... essentially we undid all the good work we had done learning patience throughout the day. Oh well, sorry for taking over the phone call sisters. 

Wednesday:

I woke up 6:30 sharp and had an analogy on my mind, I went and wrote a 2-3 page talk on it. I might link it later on or share it on my facebook profile so I won't get into it too much right now other than to say weightlifting is involved. After that, the sisters brought us muffins cause of how much we complained about our day yesterday. First off, the sisters are awesome. Secondly, we had a great day. We just found it easier at the end when we were tired to focus on all the negatives. Our minds are weird like that; we always bring the negatives up before the positives. Doing otherwise takes training, but if we can do it, we will be able to find so much more joy in our days and in our lives. We had exchanges with our zone leaders after that, which is essentially a 3 hour phone call, but it's a lot more fun than it sounds. You just gotta try it one day to find out haha. 

Thursday: 

We had our daily planning. As a part of it, I made a graph for us to examine. On one axis it was Fubeca and robot. A fubeca is someone who doesn't care about the rules and is disobedient, a robot is someone who is perfect, always doing what they are supposed to be doing, and always on topic. On the y axis we had trunky and eye of the tiger. If you are trunky, you are unmotivated, thinking about home; if you have the eye of the tiger you are driven, focused, and energetic. We use this to mark how we are feeling with our work the last day, and graph how we can improve, as well as talk about why we felt the way we did. After that, we went to a member, Brother H, to pick up a guitar for a music video Elder Bodily is doing. We ended up talking to him and his family for almost an hour and a half on the front porch. I can't even explain to you how needed that was for me. We got to know their amazing family. While we were talking, I bore my testimony on prayer and asked the kids what something they wanted to pray for was. 13 year old Camilla said she wanted to find ways to serve her friends and family. 10 year old Bela said she wanted to pray to have more patience. And 8 year old Jacob said he wanted help expressing his emotions better and controlling himself.... do I even need to comment? What amazing kids!!! If we could all have motives as simple and pure as that, think about how much closer we would be to our friends and families. Brother H started crying, and talked about how he had been having a hard time communicating with his son, and had been praying for weeks that he could know why. He bore testimony that we were an answer to his prayers, and that missionaries are sent from God to bless the lives of the people they serve. It was such a pure moment and the Spirit was so powerful. After that, we had a lesson with Pedro M that went well, and invited him to go to church on August 30. He said yes and that he would bring a friend with him. This day was simple and by far the best day on my mission so far. We had 4 nonstop hours of lessons and discussions before it ended, and every second of it was wonderful. 

Friday:

Today was my birthday. I loved reading all the messages from my friends and family. I'm so grateful for all the wonderful people I've come into contact in my life. We had district counsel, too, which was a great birthday activity, because I got to see our district in person and talk face to face. After that, I spent the next 3 hours making a video about the plan of salvation using eggs, haha. The day ended simply: blowing out a candle in some beans and rice. 

Saturday: 

So, my parents sent me a giant black happy birthday banner for yesterday. Which first off is awesome!!! Secondly, our bedroom blinds don't work, and the room gets bright SUPER early in MA. So we put it over the window Friday night and Saturday Morning was the first day I have woken up truly well rested while I've been here. Next up, I put some cookies in the oven and while I ate them, Elder Bodily and I read from the Missionary handbook. It just so happens that the section we read today was nutrition and safety... no comment. It was a slow day. I spent about 2 hours studying Preach My Gospel and fell asleep while taking a short break. I woke up with Elder Bodily shaking me and then starting to pray. Very confused I folded my arms and then looked up while Elder Bodily started teaching. Apparently, someone had called and asked if we could have a lesson early. I was very groggy and confused at first, but the lesson went great. I studied Preach My Gospel the rest of the day more or less and that was that. 

Sunday:

We had church, which today was taught by the sisters. Sister Freire is the brand new sister to the mission, and she taught the lesson fresh out of the MTC and killed it which was cool to see. After that, we had 3 lessons; all 3 which got cancelled. The sisters brought us some muffins for my birthday for the second time that week; once again, awesome. And we had 2 more lessons fall through, making a grand total of 5. I would like to say that that is not typical, but the days where that does happen is unfortunate. Anyways, after that I did some work on Facebook, got hit on by a 30 year old man and 13 year old girl, and wrapped up. One man we talked to was named Marcelo. We asked him if he was interested in hearing about Jesus Christ, and he responded he already knew of Christ. We asked if he had heard about his ministry in the Americas, and he said yes. We then asked him if he had heard of the Book of Mormon which testified of His ministry in the Americas. This time he said no, and when we explained it, he asked how much it would cost to get one. We explained it was free, and offered to bring one to his house on Monday. 

Monday:

Today was district P day, which is a day where our district can meet-up in person and hang out. We went to the beach where we just talked, caught crabs, and baked in the sun. Then we went to get some Italian pizza and some ice cream. The missionaries in my district are all so awesome; any chance we have to hang out in person is a blessing. After that, we had 2 more lessons fall through, making an unprecedented 7 in a row. But we got to drop off a copy of the Book of Mormon at Marcelo's house. We hope to have the chance to talk with him more and have a call planned on Wednesday. 

Not as steep as it looks. I promise.

Catching Crabs

Me & Elder Bodily (The Bod Squad)

The District

The Graph

Elder Terry's Last District Counsel