Semana 9

Família e amigos,


I hope you guys are all doing well. Things here in Três Lagoas are as strange and wonderful as ever. At the start of the week we had zone conference in Araçatuba, which meant getting to go by my new FAVORITE means of travel, the bus. And i say that half sarcastically half not, because it's really not that bad. We just do it all the time. But that was fun, and it was cool cause i could understand the whole 3 hours of brazilians talking. Afterwards, though, the zone leaders tried talking to me and i couldnt understand what they were saying. Sometimes the gift of tongues comes and goes. Your mind literally feels like it's been exercising after listening to another language for too long haha. But my ability to understand definitely depends on how tired i am, how hungry i am, and my mood. Probably also true for a lot of things.


In the way of miracles, we're never short of them here. We received a list of referalls from Salt Lake (apparently people actually ask to have the missionaries visit them...crazy) that we were going through. One was literally at the very edge of the city limits, that had apparently been tried before twice, but the house could never be found. Perchance, as we were walking down the highway looking for the house number (a little hopelessly) some guy pulled over and asked what we were looking for. What are the odds that his parents and uncle are members, so he recognized us as missionaries, AND that he happened to have an apt knowledge of the area and took us to our appointment. THEN when we met our investigator, he was stoked to see us, and had a grocery list of questions for us to answer. This guy was sitting on the edge of his seat the whole time we talked to him, trying to make sure he heard and understood every word we said, even through the motorcycles passing by, dogs barking, and the thunder... thundering (we dont really have a verb for this, but in português we do). It was awesome. It's always really cool to see the joy that comes to peoples lives when they hear our message and realize its what theyve been looking for. At the same time, it really sucks when they hear it, understand it, and reject it. But, such is life.


Otherwise, things are same old same old. By that i mean i wake up everyday to cats in the house, later slay some cockroaches (i hate those things by the way. I'm pretty sure they report directly to satan himself. the worst is when they can fly. who's idea was that?), later get asked if i'm american (occasionally people will just shout whatever they know in english to me), and sometimes get stuck in thunderstorms on the opposite side of the city from home. Oh, and it's getting so hot now. The other night i couldnt fall asleep it was so hot. It started raining and i just left my window open until i was sufficiently soaked and cooled off. It was great.


Stay sweet,


Elder Seaman