Hey Mom!

Sorry, this will probably be short (I say that every time), but we're going to some hot springs with the Pinto family! Yes, you need to take Sister Pinto to lunch (if she survives, she's going back to SLC early because she is way sick!), you'll love her, she's awesome and her family has done a lot for S. Davis and I! Did I tell you that Irmã Pinto bought me new shoes? She's awesome. I wore a hole all the way thru my other ones haha. Zone Conference was really good. We had some sisters stay with us, which was fun and we also had the Sister Training Leaders with us this week also! It was a little crazy because we didn't have electricity for a while (we had to pay 70 euros to get it turned back on! Turns out no one has been paying the electricity bills at all!) and we were supposed to have the gas turned off but we walked the few miles to pay (it was only for 3 euros! A tad silly). But Conference was great. I learned a lot about how to teach with more focus on the LdM as not just a test that JS was a prophet, but that it's a guide for our lives also. President and the assistants LOVED the chapel tours that we've been doing (they got to hang out and watch for a while) and all the ideas of our elders. It was a good day for the conference though because it rained ALL day!

Thanks for reminding me of the birthdays, I was gonna say that I need you to send me a list because I can't remember them all! I remembered almost all of the ones you told me though, so not to bad:). Tell them all Happy Birthday for me! I didn't get the package yet, maybe today? The yellow envelopes take longer to get here than regular letters, so it will be a little longer probably. I've just given up on my ears. It sounds like you all had a great week with lots of fun stuff! That's sad that school has started, but it'll be good, time to start learning again right?!:)

Well, this week was good. We found Sister Davis an outfit to come home in on Monday (she's gonna be adorable, too bad she's getting home at midnight!). Tuesday we had our weekly activity, which was good, and a few more people than normal came. We also had Ward missionary training which was good. I think that they're gonna learn a lot and Irmã Lucia is really excited about the new training, she just kept giving me hugs! We were supposed to be teaching José at the same time, so instead he came and he helped by being the member present during our practice lessons. He did great. He was also funny because he and Irmão Moises (who baptized him), said that when they got in the water in the font, it was cold for a second, but then it was warm, and they were both totally serious:). Awesome. We also taught a lot of firm lessons this week. We didn't hit the mission standard (we did last week on everything and we got mentioned in the weekly email from the presidente! We felt famous! It's the first time that S. Davis has been in it, and it won't be my last!), but we feel like they were really good. We have a new investigator, his name is João (Pois) and he is old and has like 3 teeth (welcome to Portugal) and smokes a ton. He lives in a little shack in a public park because he's the gardener. Whenever we teach him, he always gives us stuff. The first time, he gave us a plant, the second he gave us tons of potatoes and cabbage! It's a good thing that we walked down Hill to take them back to the apartment, because they were way heavy. He's super sweet, and he came to church and he loved it! He told us a funny joke this week, like this: Quem foi o único que andou com Cristo que não subiu ao céu com Ele?---- O Burro! Hehehe. That's funny because andar means two things. I didn't get it until later because truthfully I can't understand a word that João says. Toothless people are harder to understand haha. Divisions with the Sister Training Leaders were good also. I went with Sister Prieto from Brazil, and wow, she contacts way way suave. She definitely has no fear! S. Davis says it's a Brazilian thing:). I want to contact like that! I hope that my next companion is Brazilian and can teach me that! Plus it'd be good to be forced to speak Portuguese all of the time. I try, but sometimes I don't do so well. My Portuguese has definitely gotten better this week. I finally figured out a secret. It's that if you actually open your mouth and speak whatever comes out, no matter how bad the gramar or no matter how little sense it makes, it's better than just standing there and saying nothing and feeling guilty later! Too bad it took me so long to figure that out!

This week is gonna be a little sad with S. Davis leaving. Turns out I have seperation anxiety haha. I don't want my mission mãe to die! It's so sad! But I'll probably get to go with her to Lisboa this next P-day, so I don't know if I'll get to email. I hope that I never have to kill another companion! It's awful, though I think it's making me more trunky than it's making her haha.

Well, got to go!

Love always,

Sister Wach

Olá Mãe!

Well, this week was good. We did lots of walking and lots of teaching. We baptized an homem the other day, my first baptism (baptism is a weird word to spell, in Continental Portuguese it's batismo and in Brazilian it's baptismo, and so it's really hard for me to type:)), and the guy is awesome! He's moving though, he lives in Canada and was just here for the summer (turns out that there are lots of Portuguese people in Canada and in Boston, MA also), so that's sad. We found out though that he lives with his sister there and she lives right next to the temple! We showed him a picture (I had one in my wallet of the Toronto Temple, as crazy as that sounds, that I got from my BYU ward, the teacher served there and she gave all of us in the RS one, and for some reason I kept it there, but now I'm gonna use it!:)), and he was like, I've seen this building before! I live right by it! So that's awesome, we're excited to teach about temples and prep him for being able to go in. His baptism was good.  /The water in the font was cold! One of the pipes broke and the chapel ran out of gas, and so we tried to fill it with as much hot sink water as we could mixed with the cold water until we ran out of gas, and then we tried to boil water, but the stove broke! We've decided that technology is not on the Lord's side. José was a trooper though and he still got baptized. I wouldn't have. You couldn't have dragged me into that cold water! But then he bore his testimony afterwards, and he did great. Though he called S. Davis and I liars because we promised he'd have hot water. It was funny. Turns out that a lot of the things he says are funny. But he said that he'd never been happier and that this was what he'd been looking for. Ah, I'm so excited for him! 

We had some other cool stuff happen this week. We taught lots of member present lessons, more that other lessons, we taught 9 member present lessons, and our members helped a lot this week (well, the usual ones). But one of them Moisés, he was great. We ran into a man that knew him, and we scheduled to teach him, so we brought Moisés along, and it didn't last long, the man didn't have time to talk, so then we were like okay, well you don't have to hang out with us because we have other plans, but it's a long walk, but he said he would come too. So we went there and no one answered, and so I asked him if he knew of any menos activos and he said yes, so we started walking with him, and we ended up in the Elderes area and while we were walking we ran into a man we had taught a few times, only to have Moisés say that this man was already a member! He'd been baptized 15 years before! Moisés invited him to church and he actually came, so that was awesome! Then we kept walking and we ran into a MA that we were going to teach later that evening who told us he couldn't talk to us later, so I was like well what about now, and so he said yeah, and we walked (back into our area:)) and we taught him. Moisés was awesome. He invited some other lady that lived in the same house to come down and talk to us, and he just handed her a BOM without saying anything else except that it was about Jesus and that we would come back and tell her more about it, so we scheduled a time to meet with her. Then we taught the MA and Moisés invited him to church and said he would walk past and get him and the wife. He was awesome because he totally did it and they came, and THEN he went and drove really far to pick up one of our other investigators and her family. Moisés and his family are awesome. We also had something funny happen. We were walking to an appointment and we knocked on the door and we asked for the lady, Maria Cordeiro, and the lady who answered gave us a funny look and said it wasn't her, and we knew it wasn't, so we introduced ourselves and the church, and scheduled to talk with her, only to realize we hadn't asked her name, so we did, and it was... ready for this? Maria Cordeiro. Haha. Only in Portugal. They have a list of names that they can pick from to name their kids and nothing else. So everyone is named João, Rui, José, Maria, Gorretty, and Conceição. Oh, and on the way there, we talked with a João, with grubby hands, that we didn't think anything would happen with, and we gave him a pamphlet with our number on it, and he read the whole thing, and then he called us and said he wants to meet with us! Kind of crazy! Sister Davis says that doesn't happen very often, which I believe.

Speaking of Sister Davis! She goes home so soon, it's kind of crazy! I can't even believe it. I told her to think of me while she's laying in her bed resting and I'm trudging uphill with our groceries;)

Well, I'm almost out of time. So I'll say goodbye:) Hope you have a good week, and if anyone has sent anything, I haven't gotten it yet, our Zone Conference with president got moved to Friday, so I'll get stuff then:). Oh, guess what, something else funny happened, today, our electricity went out! I think someone didn't pay for April for all of the bills, our gas will probably go out next. Haha. Well at least all the persianas are up! It'll be interesting when we try to plan tonight and when the Sister Training Leaders come tomorrow for a division! But not having electricty is way better in my opinion than not having water haha. 

Love you all,
Have a good week, and don't forget that the gospel is true! Contact your missionaries! Send them references, help them out! 
Love ya,
Sister Wach

 

Olá Mãe!

 I'm still doing what the doctor says, which the liquids thing was only for three days, and it was great, I ate lots of ice cream and pudding, yogurt, and flan. It was definitely not a diet. But I'm doing what he says so that I can tell him when he calls that I did what he said and that it still hasn't helped. But, I'm just doing what he said. Better to tell him that I followed through and that it didn't help than to tell him that I didn't and so I have no idea if it would have helped. My ears did feel a lot better when I was only eating liquids though.

But anyway, the mission is good. We're gonna baptize someone this week! José will be baptized on Sunday and we're super excited. He's fixe! He always reads what we leave him and then when we talk about the stuff in the next lesson he's always like I already know this! And he's sharing the gospel with the people he lives with too. He always comes to church and he is super excited to be baptized! This week, one of his kids needed to get an x-ray and the appt was scheduled for Sunday and he changed it because he said that he knew that the week of church that he missed would be the week that they would talk about answers to the questions that he had! He's SO awesome!  The chapel tours are still going really well, and Elder Brooksby, the elder who was transfered in, has lots and lots and lots of really good ideas for what to do. He and Elder Fuller have got tons of inspiration rolling around in their heads! I love them both, they're awesome! Speaking of which, we're going to Sete Cidades with them and Cátia and Ana today! I'm super excited! It's gonna be awesome! Ana has a 7 seater car and she said that she'd take us! She is awesome! Thanks for sending those places that we could visit. Sadly most of the ones that you mentioned that are nearby are closed on Mondays! Like the Cave. It's right next to our apartment, as in a two second walk, and we run past it everyday, and we were so excited to go in, but sadly we're not going to get to because it's closed:(. We're teaching some other really great people also. Our planners this week are full already and it's only Monday! They're all really firm and we're excited! One of them, her name is Gorrety, and she just has noticed all the right things. She doesn't like that babies are baptized, she doesn't like the saints, she believes that like the Bible said, we should preach the gospel, some other awesome stuff.  Tuesday, we had cake because it was Elder Fuller's birthday. Sister Davis makes yummy cakes, she put black beans in it and it was perfect:). Saturday was cool, we talked to lots of people and taught lots of good lessons. Irmã Pinto e Abraão helped us with the one that we taught José and after offered us a ride home, but we still had like 20 minutes before we could go in, and so we decided to walk up the mountain instead, but it was awesome. On the way, S. Davis wanted to talk with this family and so we did, and we started talking and the man took one look at the LdM and he was like I have this book! I'm halfway through! He's in Alma and he loves it, he told us everything and then they said that we could pass by whenever and they would be super excited to talk with us. Sunday was a little rough. We had Lourdes and José and a woman named Marina with her son Gonçolo who is 7 in church, but then in Principios do Evangelho, there was an apostate member and he got everyone all crazy and it was just a big fight during the lesson. It was sad because it was supposed to be about Casamento Eterno and it would have been perfect for Marina whose husband passed away, but instead it was just a fight. She said they´d come back again, but if I was them, I don't think I would. Afterward, we were just totally exhausted and it was a little rough because we ended up walking lots which is hard with all the hills, but it was still good. Hehe, something funny happened. There was this drunk man, and we walked past him and he was seriously weaving and we said boa tarde because we do to every person that we see, and he stopped because he wanted to talk to us, and so he said a bunch of unintelligible words except the word "Irmãzinhas" and then he took a step closer and he said "Eu não gosto vocês". It was the funniest thing, but we sure got out of there fast! Today we had someone come who is going to fix our apartment! Yeah! Last week we didn't have water, this week we had floods! So the man is fixing the kitchen sink, the bathroom sink, the light in the hall and the bathroom (some sort of electrical problema) and the window cover. Poor guy, but yeah! Oh, and we're not moving anymore. The casal isn't coming anymore, or at least they're waiting for a little longer because I guess the husband is having some sort of health problems. It's sad because we really need them. I hope they come soon. Well, I hope all is well!

Thanks for everything! Thanks for the cute package, it was fun to look at that stuff. Oh, and I don't know if I'll email this next pday because we're having zone conference with presidente on pday instead so we won't have a pday. So, don't worry if I don't email back

Love you!

Sister Wach

 

 

Oi Mãe!

Desculpa! I don't remember getting any questions from last week. I didn't get a letter with money in it. I did get a very cute package with sunshine, so thank you very much! Did you send the one with money to my apartment or to the mission home? If you sent it to the mission home, we only get mail once every 6 weeks and we won't be getting it until the 22 of Julho. President and Sister Fluckiger are coming for a Zone conference and all the missionaries from Terceira are coming too. Terceira is where the US military base is, so maybe they'll bring me some treats;). By the way, my address is not Rua do "Pain"! Though that would make sense hehe. But no, it's "Paim." The letters still come, but Sister Davis and I always laugh at them. Oh, and with my ears, we figured out what could be wrong. The Mission Doctor, who is serving in Germany (it's weird to talk to him because it's hard to speak in English to him because he only speaks English and we hardly ever speak English) called a doctor in Salt Lake and told him my symptoms and he said that it's my jaw not my ears! I think he called it TMJ? Well I was on a good little liquid diet where Sister Davis ate tons of good foods in front of me and I had to eat sopa:P. Lame sauce. I have to take 4 ibuprofens every 8 hours and I'm also not allowed to eat anything hard, including lettuce or bread. It's hard to eat only liquids when your a missionary. We went and visited Irmão Ernesto and Irmã Lourdes this week, some members from the ward, because Irmão Ernesto had had surgery, and we took them a small gift, and of course they fed us. And of course what they fed us was lettuce, bread, and eggs. Two of three of the things aren't allowed! I don't think I've ever eaten so much lettuce. Oh, and you'll be happy to know that I'm drinking milk again and yogurt too. Every day. Only the milk probably cancels out since I put tons of Nesquick in there! 

You'll also be proud of me because I went three whole days without showering! The hottest days on the island so far! I went from three showers at home with you to none here!;) We didn't have water in our apartment and since we live at the top of a huge hill, it's kind of hard to lug up enough water to bathe, so we only got enough to drink. I'm gonna have some great arm muscles when I get home;). But the water was out because someone hadn't paid the bill in April... which we weren't even in that apartment for, so that was annoying because we had to take time out of our schedules to go and pay the bill, which took us 3 days to find the time to go. I've never felt so yucky in my life haha. It was good though. I now know that I can survive sem showers;). 

Oh, and the woman that I talked about last week, or at least I think I talked about her? Well, her name is Maria do Carmo, and we met her with the chapel tours, and she was walking past and yelled at us that she needed to call us and that she had our number, and so she called and we set up an appointment. Well, we met with her, and we had Irmã Teotonia with us, the president of the Sociedade Socorro, and it was just a big hilarious thing. Turns out they knew each other, they used to work together, so that was great. But we got to the chapel and we invited her in, and she was kind of shocked that we were going to meet inside. But she came in and she started talking all about how Sister Davis and I need help! She was talking about our acne! Which mine is way way way way way way bad. She called Sister Davis "blotchy" and me just plain zitty. Hehe. Turns out she works for some company that sells stuff for it. So she goes off about how it's because of something with my liver and how she can fix it. Then we told her that we didn't have money and she said well think about it and she gave us a pamphlet to look at. Then we taught her the first lesson! It was really cool and she is muito simpática! If she gets baptized then Sister Davis and I will be thankful for our zits! We met with her again after, and we're meeting with her this week too, so we can only hope:). The members are crazy about our zits too. I didn't have acne really bad until I got here (I thought I did, but who was I kidding:)) but it's so bad right now. But Irmã Pinto is the cutest thing. Haha, she bought me baby powder to put on my face and some random cream that is gross. The baby powder is actually working, but it's a lot of fun to wear at night. I'll send a picture. I'll just think of my acne as a blessing, at least it keeps the groody men away;).

We have a man that we're teaching who is really awesome. His name is José and he's Portuguese and speaks only Portuguese, but he is here working for a little while before he moves back to Canada. Turns out there are lots of Portuguese people in Canada and in Boston, MA. But he's great. We met him with the chapel tour and we've marked him to be baptized on the 21 of Julho! I think he actually will be! He's been working really hard and has not been smoking or drinking coffee. He has also been to church twice, two weeks in a row. He was even sick this week and he still came (which is bad and good haha). He prayed and he knows the Book of Mormon is true because he was praying and he looked up and saw two lights flick on, like Jesus and Pai Celestial appearing to Joseph Smith, and took that as his answer. When we showed him the baptismal font he said that he had had a dream about it too. He is also on time and always shows up for our compromissos!

Well, I've got to go!

Love you all, have a great week!

Love always,

Sister Wach

July 1, 2013

Okay, so this is gonna be a really really quick email, and I mean this for real haha. This week was good. Tuesday was sad. We had our family history activity, and only the elders, us, the Familia Pinto, and two recent converts of the elders (only because the elders brought them) came. Not even all the people we asked to speak came! It was sad, but it still turned out really good anyway, it was just a bummer because we made posters and we even handed out over 100 invites to people we met in the street and no one came except our really awesome family and our elders. That's fine, they just missed out on our chocolate chip cookies. Speaking of which, I need a good recipe for them, could you send me one?  Then we found out that Elder Semedo was getting an emergency transfer! It was super sad. I cried haha. Who will I say Sai pa fora! (Creole) and Iniquidade! with now?! He was great. Cape Verdianos are the best ever. One of them though, the poor thing, caught some bug this week and he's been throwing up for days and I think I heard the word "blood" mentioned with that throw up! Yikes! I feel really bad for him. Oh, and I finally was able to read a letter that Dad sent me in the CTM (it was in Portuguese and I've finally advanced enough to read it) tell him that they don't say the same thing as the Brasilieros, but instead they say "Não eh?"  Oh, and I broke my bracelet, the one from China! I didn't cry, but I'm really sad, I guess I'll just have to go back and get another, but I still have a really awesome tan line from it! I don't really remember much of the other days, mainly they consist of lots of walking, but we did have some cool things happen. We ran into a woman who said she'd driven by the chapel two weeks ago and seen two women standing in front singing (us! we always sing during the tours so that we can invite the spirit and draw eleitos!) and she told her husband that she wanted to stop by some time. That was really awesome. We're meeting with her this week. Most of the other good things we have had this week are because of the chapel tours, they're a really good idea, I'm glad that I thought to steal them from Dakota haha. Plus this week, the 1st Presidency did a really cool transmission about missionary work and members (it's on the website called the Work of Salvation or something ruther) and it was really amazing, and the chapel tour things are really inspired because they announced that we will now be doing it every week all over the world! Plus we will be using Facebook and blogs and other internet things! Should be great. I'm excited!  I also saw Sarah Eisert on the broadcast, so that was cool too!

Well, got to go!

Love you all!

Sister Wach