Thursday, June 26, 2014

Worst Week catch up

 June 12, 2014
            Since I lost my journal, it’s been really hard for me to stay caught up with my entries.  I guess that proves how easy it is to loose a good habit. A couple of days ago we had a zone training meeting where we focused on how to teach people rather than merely teaching lessons.  Then we had the opportunity to put that into practice while teaching a lesson on the plan of salvation.  That lesson turned into a 2 hours lesson that was really difficult.  The guy was a spiritist and couldn’t understand the concept of resurrection.
            Yesterday was a great day because we got to teach this 11 year old kid who really wants to learn.  His uncle is in the young men’s presidency and he has a cousin serving a mission, but his Mom is not very supportive.  She did agree to go to church with her son if he liked it (which he did!)
            I went on splits with one of the zone leaders, Elder Gali. He gave me feedback afterwards and basically gave me a little compliment and then pretty much chewed me out the rest of my teaching.  In the beginning of my mission, I would have been really irritated by this, but I have learned to just accept the advice and move on.  I worry a little bit about how Levi will handle this type of situation, because it is really hard to not want to fight with guys like this.  I also got chewed out because my apartment was messy.  We have been waiting to clean it when we move which has been delayed for the past two weeks.  Unfortunately, the rationalization meant that the tiny apartment got pretty dirty.  When Elder Gali saw the mess, he basically threw a hissy fit and chewed me out even more.  We started cleaning and I felt super ashamed of myself that I had let the house get so dirty.  I felt truly sorry.  Once everything was clean, I felt a weight being lifted and was happy again. So our house is super clean right now and we will have to do it again when we get the final word that we can move.  Repentance is a good thing.
            Today is the opening game of the World cup and we didn’t even leave our house because of the concern about safety during all of the parties and rioting.  There were more fireworks today than there were on New Years!  It’s crazy how CRAZY people are about soccer.  Seriously, the only time that Brazilians are patriotic is when there is soccer involved. 

June 13, 2014
            So today was a downer.  Well, it had a good share of its ups and downs.  Fortunately we planed the day really well so that we still had a couple of people to teach after most of our plans fell through.  We had some really great lessons with E. and he is helping us work with a family that is trying to overcome some serious problems.  That family is challenging for us.
            In another lesson we learned how challenging it is trying to reactivate a sister who never really was active in the first place.  She doesn’t have, nor probably ever did have, a testimony about anything.  Her little 8 year old daughter really wanted to be baptized this week but the mom said no and doesn’t want to bring her daughter to church anymore.  It was really heartbreaking for me to hear this little girl’s sincere testimony and desire be silenced by her mother.
           
June 14, 2014
            I got to do my first interview of the transfer. It is always fun to interview people because they’re the best investigators who actually have the desire to change and be baptized.  Anyways, we had a bunch of investigators decide that they didn’t want to be taught anymore…worst part of being a missionary.

June 15, 2014
            Our little 11 year old superstar took his whole family to church today and really liked it (though he was not super crazy about Primary) He told us afterwards that it was just a bunch of little kids.  Thankfully, he liked the rest of church and said that he will come back.  We had another investigator and his family come to church today too.  He is struggling with the word of wisdom but has gone two days without smoking. The coolest thing happened today, Ev. our recent convert, was called to be the ward mission leader.  He was feeling insecure, but we talked with him and he seems super excited about it.  It’s going to be really nice because he literally  is our next door neighbor.  

June 16, 2014
            We ate breakfast with the Bishop, exercised with his son Bruno, did our studies and emailed, ate lunch with the Bishop, learned a little bit of guitar in his house, went to the chapel and watched Frozen in English.  (I had the revelation that all Disney princesses are home schooled which explains a lot.) We taught a few lessons in the afternoon and then we returned to the Bishop’s house for dinner.  I think that the likes us : )
             One of our families is struggling to overcome addictions which is really hard for me to know how to handle.  I am praying really hard to know what to do.

June 17, 2014
            Yet another day stuck in the house during a Brazil game.  It is Brazil vs. Mexico.  I am taking advantage of the extra time to write and rest.  I think that I will write  a few letters!  Our house is still really clean and we are still waiting to move.

June 18, 2014
            I gave the training in the district meeting this week on The Book of Mormon.  I think that it went pretty well.  I tried to focus on how we could help other people become “hungry” to read the book.  To illustrate this, I had everyone describe their favorite food in such a way that you would make your companion hunger for the food. It turned out well and everyone thought I was creative, except it wasn’t my idea.  Elder Da Hora gave me the same training in Bom Jardim!  Not very creative, hugh?
            We had a lesson with one of our familys about the Law of Chastity, during our lesson with them, the mailman interrupted the lesson and he was a member for 20 years.  He saw us teaching so he bore his testimony of our message and then left.  It was super weird, but actually helped us a lot.
            I saw a super old car that I have never seen before, a 73 Puma GTF.  It is unusual to see little old sportscars here.


 June 19, 2014
            Man, having appointments fall through must be some requirement to being a missionary.  But we invited a bunch of people to a stake party tomorrow night, arranged rides for our investigators, etc.  Sadly, we can’t go.  Well, we can go, but President Souza doesn’t want us to go because he doesn’t want it turning into a party for the missionaries. He really doesn’t want any fun for the missionaries.  Actually, I think that he doesn’t trust the missionaries because this mission was a MESS when he got here and he doesn’t want to let things get out of hand. It is his very last week as President, and then we get a new president.  I have no idea what is going to change, but everyone says that there are Huge changes with a new president.

June 20, 2014
            Ev., our new ward mission leader, loved the party!  Sadly, we didn’t go, but it was worth it. The party was some kind of cultural dance festival or something like that. Every one thought that it was hilarious because there was one dance that everyone does in couples, but Ev. managed to do it with his two daughters!  Also, our investigator went and liked the activity and his kids had fun too.
            Once again, almost all of our appointments fell through, but we kept on pushing on and because we sacrificed our night of “fun”, we managed to find a super cool family.  Some time ago we contacted this 15 year old skater/surfer kid who turns out to be an atheist (which really means that he is just trying to be different.)  anyways we went to his house and talked with his older brother for a long time.  His brother is really interested in teaching him some more and wants to help his younger brother listen to our message. 

June 21, 2014
            Well today was probably the worst day of my mission other than the day that I found out that my Dad has cancer.  All of our appointments fell through as usual and then we had to drop teaching our best family that we were preparing for baptism because of some very serious problems.  It’s on a scale that us missionaries can’t deal with and it was really sad for everyone.  It made Elder L. and I really think. A lot.  But, what can you do?  Just keep going.

June 22, 2014
            So we passed by the houses of 6 different investigators to remind them about church and not a single one went.  We had luck when one showed up that we did not remind, but then he kept sneaking out during the services to take a smoke. Funny thing is that he did not want to bring his cigarettes into the Lord’s house so he hid them outside. I went out and talked with him while he was sitting on the sidewalk in between meetings.  I asked him why he smokes and he told me that he “wants” to.  It is true of the people in my mission that they don’t do anything that they don’t want to do either good or bad. I talked to this investigator about Jesus Christ and how he had to suffer for our sins even though he really didn’t want to.  On the contrary, he begged His Father that the bitter cup might be taken away, but in the end he did the Father’s will and drank the bitter cup so that we might all be forgiven through the power of the atonement.  This illustrated the importance of obedience and putting aside our selfish desires.  I asked my investigator if he understood how important it is that we obey God’s commandments. He said he understood, but then right after taking the sacrament he snuck out again to take another smoke.  That pretty much sums up how effective my week was.

June 23, 2014
            I hope that you got the pictures of our new house that we FINALLY moved into.  We have a little elbow room now and it is much nicer that the tiny cramped place we were in.  (Don’t worry, I left it very clean.), There is another game for Brasil tonight, soooo I'm going to sleep. Big time. I'm really tired, and I think that it'll be nice to take a day off and relax. Also it's p-day, so we can afford to take time to relax! I just want you guys to know that you might not even recognize me by the time that I finish my mission because it's only been a year, but I'm already way different. I've learned a ton, and I can't even begin to imagine what the next year of my mission is going to bring me. Can you believe that I'm already at the year mark? Is it taking forever for you guys, or is it passing quickly? It's a combination of the two for me.
These apartments all look alike to me!



Wednesday, June 18, 2014

World Cup and missionary work

Soooooooooooo I kind of forgot to write in my journal this week... But, there's a Brasil Mexico game in our backyard tomorrow, so I'll get caught up tomorrow, I promise. 

This week... was annoying. We had a lady that we were teaching tell us that she didn't want to receive visits anymore and that she wanted to go back to her church. It was super annoying because all she ever said was 'I want, I want, I want' and never once stopped to think what God wants. We tried talking to her, but her heart was set, and she didn't want to change her mind. She even told us, 'even if I am wrong, this is I want and if I'm wrong then I'll take the consequences'. I don't know about her, but I like to confirm things with God before making a decision like that. BUUUUT, she didn't even think twice about it. She's a less active member with a little 8 year-old girl. This girl is absolutely precious and I got really upset with her mom because she wouldn't even pray to know what she would do, and when she did pray, she prayed and went right to sleep without waiting for an answer. Anyways, the little girl said that she would go to church without her mom because she knew that it was true. They even had an argument about it in front of us. After the lesson I got super sad.                                        

We had another lady that wanted us to stop visiting her as well because she likes her church a lot. She believes that everything that we taught her is true,  but still didn't want to follow what God was telling her. Really the frustrating part isn't when people reject you, but it's when people accept you, recognize that your message is true, and then say that they won't follow through with it. That's frustrating.                                                                     

Anyways, on the bright side of things, we finally moved to our new house!!! Our old one was only 1 room with a bathroom and a tiny kitchen  Way too cramped
for 2 men with full wardrobes. The new house is a lot better, and a lot *cooler* (nothing here is cold). I got to play basketball last monday, so that was kind of fun for a change. The World Cup is happening right now and we couldn't even leave our house on Wednesday because it's 1. dangerous and 2. no one wants to hear about anything other than soccer. Thankfully, we can leave on every other day other than days that have a game for Brasil. (Hey, you should watch the World Cup and root for Brasil!). There's basically a game in our backyard tomorrow. We live super close to the stadium, and tomorrow is going to be the game between Brasil and Mexico! It's going to be crazy! 

Anyways, we're teaching this family that we're helping overcome some addictions (smoking and maybe a little bit more serious stuff) but they're super happy to have some help. Also, there's this 11 year old kid who wants to serve a mission soooooo we're helping him out ;) haha! I'm happy, and that's what matters, right? You deal with rejection, you've just got to keep going. You have a victory, rejoice a little bit! Haha take pleasure in the little things that happen in life. That's also another big lesson that I'm learning right now.


I'm super busy. Like, super super busy. But it's good.

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

A great companion!

The best part of the week was when our recent convert baptized his little girl.
 June 5, 2014

     Transfer week!  It was a super crazy one for me.  There were 2/3 of the mission at the transfer meeting and in my zone half of the missionaries left.  The influx of missionaries to my zone brought a definite international mix.  We now have 8 North Americans, 7 Argentinians, 4 Brazilians, and 1 Peruvian. It is going to be exciting to see how it will work out with all those Argentinians here during the world cup.  They are perceived as the arch rivals of Brazil and there are some pretty strong negative feelings that work both ways!  But I am convinced that our zone is going to be awesome this transfer.  Elder Gair and Elder Bramwell (our zone leaders) are chalk-full of great ideas for our zone.  One of their ideas is that everyone in the zone is going to pray specifically for one companionship for the entire week.  This week our prayers are to be focused on Elder Lemos and Elder Colvin…ughh okay.  So the zone will be praying specifically for miracles to happen for me and my companion. That will be cool to see how that turns out.   

     Today we had a really unusually spiritual lesson with K, who is a woman about our age.  She told us that she enjoyed our visit and then she prayed for the first time in 6 years.  In her prayer she said that she was sorry for the things that she has been doing that are wrong and thanked God for the things that she didn’t feel hat she deserved.  After her prayer she told us that she felt the love that God has for her and she said that she wants to go to church.

     Ev. continues to progress since his baptism.  He is reading The Book of Mormon and really savoring the details of the scriptures.  Think, seminary teacher details and that is how he is reading.  It's kind of funny because he told us that before he started reading that he was skeptical because he has always been taught that there is only the Bible which is the word of God.  But he started reading the Book of Mormon and two days later he bore his testimony that he knew that it was the word of God.  He is an awesome person!

     I didn't write between the two.... I've been trying to find more time to write, but it's really hard :( Journals are a pain in the butt. i don't know how you had each of us keep one until we were about 10. I actually really like writing in my journal, it's even fun, but finding the time to write is the hardest part! 



June 8, 2014

Elder Lemos

     This was a super good day.  I am really liking my new companion.  We teach well together and think basically the same thing during the lessons.  Seriously, sometimes I fell like I should say something and he goes ahead and testifies or teaches about the exact same thing that I was thinking.  He likes to run, so I will finally have a companion who helps me stay in shape.  He likes to play soccer (a lot), videogames, and manga (it’s pretty popular down here.) He is a hard worker and we have no problems meeting our goals. One thing that is different about Elder Lemos is that he likes to get up earlier than we are supposed to (very unusual from my experience).  I actually like getting up early too, but today I was like – NO WAY!  But since he was up, I ended up getting up at 6:20.  I don’t need an alarm to get me up anymore, I just wake up automatically. We left the house early to go and see if we could encourage investigators to go to church. Not a single person went!  Luckily the members were able to bring 3 investigators to church so it wasn’t too bad.



     The best part of the day was that Ev. was able to baptize his daughter and it was the coolest thing.  The pictures are adorable  Afterwards, we taught them about family prayer and how it can help us. It was a really good lesson.  Pretty soon Ev. mom will be going to church as well.  She was closed off at first, but since she has seen the change in her son, she is more open to our messages and she is reading the Book of Mormon.   



     With the change in the zone/district, I don’t have to look after 8 sisters anymore.  I now have only 4 sisters and 2 of them are new to the field this week.  I need to spend some time talking with the new sisters and learning more about them so that I can help them.

     I have been sick with a hacking cough for over a week now. I am lucky because it doesn’t stop me from working, but it is quite pronounced.  I think that I will ask for a blessing tomorrow.  I am looking forward to the work next week…it’ll be another good one!

    (Note from the transcriptionist: the following sentences were included unedited to demonstrate the deterioration of Elder Colvin's  English skills.)  But hey, the sisters of my old district (I don't have 8 anymore, only 4) told me how I can wear watches with metal on the back!!! Use moleskin!!!! It's genius!!! Until now it's working like a charm, and I don't get blisters anyways so I have a tone of moleskin that I won't be using on my feet. Cool, huh?

Monday, June 2, 2014

Minor Update/Minor Problems

Sadly, I don't have any pictures this week because of a broken camera, and I don't have an update from my journal because I lost it... Ugh. This week was a little bit hectic because everyone was baptizing in my district, and I had to do a bunch of interviews Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night. That means that we lost 3 nights worth of work. And our nights are the best times to work! Then I realized that this is a great problem to have since it is not really a problem at all but a blessing. When I had to do some interviews in the stake center, it just so happened that someone from Nova Aldeota was having their wedding there at the same time!!! It was so weird to see so many familiar faces after months of change. Everyone was telling me how I speak português a lot better now and it was just great. I hugged everyone that I could (except for the women of course)



Elder Farr almost killed this super old lady when he baptized her, but it turned out okay in the end. I broke my bishop in an arm wrestling match! Actually, he beat me, but only after blood came out of his nose. I definitely got a little bit scared. He's going to the doctor for a checkup today, so he'll ask about whether or not he should worry about it.



I have a new comp, Elder Lemos.  He's from Curitiba, he's 20, was baptized 5 years ago and he's the only member in his family. He seems to be pretty cool, and a hard worker, so I think that I'm going to like him. He has been out for 6 months, has a fiance, annnnnnd yeah. It's always super hard to describe your new comp when you don't even know them very well. I'm going through companions super quickly....) I haven’t stuck with the same companion for more than one transfer in almost my entire mission. It's a little bit annoying, but what can you do?



So, I have to say that I'm sorry, and I have to thank you at the same time. I lost my journal because I left it in the taxi.... Ugh. I still have the one that Maddie gave to me. Thank you so much for updating all of the entries on my blog so that I won't lose everything entirely :) I love you and I'm proud of all of the hard work that you do.  I hope that you guys are going to continue being blessed because of the missionary work that all of us are doing. I'm super tired like always, but it'll pass.... When I get home! Haha.  I think that it's almost a requisite to be tired to be a missionary if you are trying to be a good missionary! I love you all, and I hope that your week is awesome!

Sunday, June 1, 2014

Major Update


Me, making my nightly phone calls.
 May 12, 2014
This is the only type of watch I can wear because of a metal allergy!
            Man, I don’t have any time!  I have resolved to write in my journal in the morning before my day starts in order to make sure that I don’t run out of time at the end of the day.  It is the only time that I can find to write!  I have to talk to five different companionships every night, and four of them are sisters.  I actually like calling the Sisters better than the Elders because they will let me know how their day was, instead of the standard, “it was good” answer from the Elders.  Anyways, I like all of the sisters and I don’t have any problems with them.  There is one sister who struggles with poor health, but that is the only problem. 
            We haven’t had any time in the last two p-days to write letters because we have been practicing a musical number for when Elder Andersen comes to visit the mission.  He is going to give a conference next week and it’s going to be so cool.  I will get to play the accompaniment, which is nerve wracking since I don’t get much practice time other than p-day. 
            We did teach F., she is a super receptive lady who asks a lot of really good questions and is fun to teach. 

May 13, 2014
            We have a few serious investigators who are making progress in learning the gospel.  We had a perfect day of teaching with lots of appointments and we worked super hard.  My companion is a great companion and the only problem that I can find with him,  to tell you the truth, is that he always thinks (or talks like) his opinion is the only thing that exists in the world. A little bit like Levi in that aspect, BUT I'm glad that I learned to work things out with Levi so I had some practice with that. The other is that he never uses a watch. Sadly, that means that we teach lessons that are on average an hour long. Other than that, he works hard, know the gospel, has a firm testimony, and doesn't have fear when it comes to inviting people to do stuff.

May 14, 2014 (Sister Colvin’s 22nd Birthday!)
            Well today as a riot!  Our district meeting was super good. We got to practice with Sister Jackson and Sister Brasil.  We practiced being missionaries first, and our first time was good, but lacked showing a personal interest in the investigators lives. So we practiced again and this time, well, I could barely keep myself together because one of the Sisters pretended to cry because of a personal crisis and I was trying so hard not to laugh.  Seriously, I was laughing so hard that I was crying too.  I managed to pull myself together and make it a good practice.
            Last night my comp got on another political rant.  I was getting super frustrated until I realized that my companion thinks in theory not in practice.  It took me a long time to figure this out.  I just don’t want to get into these discussions with him anymore. They are not good missionary topics.
            We went to teach a lady tonight and as we were arriving at her house 5 cop cars pull up in front of her house.  Someone threw a gun in her house as he was making his getaway.  Anyways, we were going to teach her at another members house, but she didn’t want to go because she thought I was flirting with one of the members.  I am completely lost at times in understanding how these people think!

May 15, 2014
            L. is excited for his baptism!  He finally says that he feels ready. She still has to work out a day that his family can come, but it’s finally going to happen. We went to teach C., but her mom was going to send us away because she was busy building dog collars.  We helped her out. After about a half an hour of building dog collars, we gave a great lesson on faith and works and invited everyone to church.  Then we had a meeting with our ward mission leader tat went well.  (side note: C. ended up coming to church and brought two of her friends!)

May 16, 2014
             We had a frustrating day of teaching people who don’t really want to change their lives or be helped.  There where two exceptions though. One is a woman who is a little intellectually delayed, but has a very sincere and pure heart. She is 24 years old but thinks like a 12 year old.  It was pretty cool to interview her and see what she has learned about the gospel in the past 5 years that she has been investigating the church.  The time finally arrived that she was prepared to be baptized and she was so excited.
            We also were able to teach Ev. He has worked so hard to prepare himself for baptism.  He got out of rehab a little while ago where he spent 7 months cleaning up his life.  He knew that he needed spiritual strength to withstand temptation so he is highly motivated to change. He locked himself in his house for 3 days and prayed fervently to God to help him find out how to be stronger spiritually.  That’s when we knocked on his door (he was a referral from our Bishop) and he said that it was an answer to his prayer.  He is by far the most prepared person that I have met as a missionary. He even cancelled other appointments on Sunday so that he could go to church. 

May 17, 2014
            Well today was mostly frustrating and discouraging.  The only thing that went well was our interview with Ev., and it was awesome.  I have never had the chance to interview someone so ready to be baptized!  We talked and talked and really got to know one another and I could actually see his conversion in my mind. 

May 18, 2014
            We had 8 investigators at church today!  The coolest Sunday ever!  We have our conference with Elder Andersen tomorrow and I am looking forward to it!

May 19, 2014
             We went to the conference REALLY early because all of the missionaries were excited to see each other and visit with each other before the conference.  I saw Elder Gino, Nogueira, Curty, Zuniga, Freeman, Butuly, Cetraro, and a bunch of others.  It was great to see so many familiar faces.  Then we spent a half hour organizing everyone into groups to get pictures with the Apostle.  Everything went really well.  Elder Andersen did a pretty good job with his Portuguese.  I was pretty impressed.  The musical number went well.  It was a great conference and was more like a discussion than a conference. He focused on the Atonement and how we can only help people to be converted to Christ when we are converted ourselves. This requires a better understanding of the Atonement on our part as missionaries.  I wrote more about what I leaned in my study journal.  One of the cool things that I got to do was bear my testimony about general conference directly to an apostle. It felt super weird, but I could feel the spirit present as I spoke.  It was once in a lifetime experience.

May 20, 2014
            So weekly planning went well, but our zone leaders called us and wanted the entire zone to do a special fast.  I really don’t like fasting (it must be a Colvin thing), so this spur-of-the-moment idea was kind of annoying for me at first.  BUT, we went ahead and did it anyways. 
            We visited a recent convert who has serious family issues including depression, and just doesn’t even want to go to church anymore.  We’ve been visiting her a lot to try to give her courage and she literally complains and cries about the exact same thing every time we visit her. I actually think that she uses the exact same words every time we talk to her.  I explained a few principles of the gospel that would help her and she acted like she hadn’t heard a word of what I said.
            We visited with Ev. and he was the shining star of our day.  He is going to be baptized this week.  He is very excited to start a new life and he has such a strong desire to improve himself.  I really like helping him!

May 21, 2014
            Today was really a good day!  For one, I got my package today, which always makes for a good day!  We had our district meeting and I gave the training.  I think that it went well. For my training, I was super creative and I had interactive activities and an object lesson and a practice. I started off explaining a little about our purpose as missionaries and then I asked all f the zone to write on a slip of paper what they thought their purpose was.  To my surprise, it worked even better than I imagined.  There were very few repeats and only our zone leaders put down “to baptize”. (Actually it was anonymous but you could tell that it was our Zone leaders who wrote it.) Then we talked about what everyone wrote down and I summarize by finding the common thread, which was change.  Our purpose is to change and help others to change and become better people. My object lesson involved a container of dirt and water. I asked to look for the greatest change and then I dropped rocks in each container.  The rocks represented us as missionaries. Most of the missionaries said that the container of water changed the most because the water splashed, rippled, and rose when the rocks were dropped in.  Not a whole lot happened to the container of dirt when the rocks were dropped in.  Then I said, it is time for transfers, and I took the rocks out of the containers.  Again I asked which container reflected the biggest change.  There was no visible difference in the water container because the splashes and the ripples didn’t last, but with the dirt, the rocks left marks in the sand - marks, or changes that left a lasting impression.  That was the focus on my training, not to just make a temporary wave or splash, but to leave a lasting impression, make a real difference wherever you go. After the zone training, we broke our fast together.  I shared the jellybeans that Mom sent in my package and they were a big hit. Most of the zone is made up of American sister missionaries, so I was happy to give them a treat from home. Everyone loved them!

May 22, 2014
            We taught the commandments to E. today and it went well. I really liked when we taught him the Word of Wisdom. He understands addictions and how they have a negative impact on the quality of life.  When we explained that coffee wasn’t something that is good for our bodies and can be addictive, he immediately got rid of his coffee and said, “I am going to find something else to drink tomorrow!”  He is so open and willing to obey all of the commandments so that he can have a better life.
            My camera broke today…uggh, something screwed up the focus mechanism.  I guess that I will have to buy a new camera. 
            We had family night with some of the members and I made snickerdoodles for everyone!  It was great! I didn’t eat too much though because I was feeling kind of sick.

May 23, 2014
            Well today I feel like crap.  I hate getting sick as a missionary because it makes work even harder.  We taught some lessons and I had an interview with some sister missionaries.  I had to go to Aguanano and then the interviews fell through so that was a waste of an evening.  I did have the opportunity to buy a Brazilian shirt that is a special edition for the world cup.  It’s a cool shirt and it only cost $12 so I was pretty excited. It was the highlight of my day.

May 24, 2014
            We had a de-roofing service project today.  I was still feeling like crap so it was hard for me.  I worked until I had to leave to talk with L. about his baptism.  He chose to move his baptism until June 22, almost a month from now.  Anyways, I didn’t eat anything but a banana for lunch because I was still not feeling well.  We taught another lesson to a less active family and then I took another trip to Aguanambi.  This time the interview went well and we were able to set up the meeting between the President and Ev. for his baptism.  Everything worked out really well, even though I still felt terrible. 

May 25, 2014
            Ev. was baptized today!  It was a super experience for everyone.  He was rally happy. I know that I will always remember him and that moment in time.