February 23, 2010 - Letter Home

It never was easy!

 "My messy desk"

 Heellllooooo my family!
Another P-day has come! This week is transfers week too! This means that 6 weeks have passed since I’ve been with Elder Lima. Honestly, I cannot believe how fast this transfer has gone. It’s absolutely crazy how fast time is flying here for me. It actually kind of freaked me out a bit the other day when I thought about it, about the fact that really, my mission is going to go by like the blink of an eye, and I really feel like I haven’t begun to really kick into action and become the super missionary that I felt I would be. I definitely thought that by 6 months in I would be totally running things and baptizing like crazy, but the reality is that I feel like I’ve only recently gotten to a comfortable level of fluency in the language, and while I’m happy and having fun and working hard, it does seem like this transfer with Elder Lima will end like it started: without a lot of people to teach, and without prospects of anybody ready to be baptized. 

What I really want is to be able to be that type of scriptural missionary that prays and fasts and works diligently every second of every hour, have visions of where and who to contact, know exactly what to say to every person to help them gain a testimony, do a bunch of miracles, and just convert the entire area just like Ammon and Aaron did with the Lamanites. That’s what I want. And while I know that, yeah, I guess it’s possible, I can’t help but hold back a little bit, and settle for the vision of the modern missionary: a young person who’s in a strange place, who messes up a bunch, learns a bunch, makes a bunch of friends with companions and with the people, does his work, but has fun and every so often has a couple really cool spiritual experiences. 
See the difference? 
It’s the difference between Jack and Locke in Lost: Jack woke up confused in the jungle, and started to act like anyone would expect a good doctor to do in the same situation, sharing the same fears and desires of everyone else on the island, and people looked up to him because they identified with him. Locke, on the other hand, woke up among the wreckage and destruction with an air of destiny, and everyone was surprised to see him become completely at home on the island, hunting, exploring, trying to find out the deeper meaning of things. People looked up to Locke, because he was different, because he didn’t share the same fears and desires as the rest of the people on the island. Both guys are good, I think, but it’s different. So basically I want to be Locke, but it’s a lot easier to try to be Jack. Unfortunately, right now I feel a lot like Boone or Charlie, just kind of bumbling around and doing a lot of cool things, but nothing REALLY amazing still. It’ll come.

Okay, I won’t continue on that thread more; just a peek into my mind today. :)

 "Have you seen my ride?"

So the work is kind of going the same: we have a couple families we’re working with, that are making progress but many still have not yet come to church, we’re trying to contact every day and find new people, and we average maybe 2 new families per day, but at the same time we’re cutting families that don’t show or don’t progress. I’ll describe our most promising families:

Celson is a nonmember husband of Katcha, a member who was inactive but is coming back to the church. Katcha lost her sight suddenly about 3 years ago, and because of this, her last husband committed suicide, and she was depressed for a long time but is finally getting better and getting used to her new mode of life. Really sad story. Celson is catholic and works in construction and has lived a single life of work, bars and football games. But he’s starting to ask questions about what he really wants out of life, and we’re helping him. He really has promise but because he smokes it might be a while before he’s baptized.

Lila is a mother of 5 who has a member friend Carla, and has been reading the Book of Mormon regularly every day. Really awesome! She loves visiting with the missionaries and just conversing and shooting the breeze and asking about America and our lives and I think she will be baptized, which will probably lead her 2 youngest children to be baptized as well, but… she needs to stop smoking which will take a while.

We have a couple other families which we haven’t met with very much, but seem to have promise, like Cristina who has two young boys, one which reminds me of Zach, actually. And Guilarme and Juliana, who have 2 girls, the oldest of which is undergoing cancer treatments.

Hmmm. Right now I’m on a division in Ereshin, with two other missionaries. The problem is that they’ve finished (quite quickly I think!) writing, and want to go bowling. So they’re waiting for me to finish. Elder Lima usually watches cartoons for hours while I type, so it’s a bit different this week. I think I’m going to have to end it early this week. Sorry :(.

I am going to make a quick video to send to you to quickly wrap up everything else that I wanted to say.


see my video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_9OWJNKkgY 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYXI7RuM9zU
 
Okay,
Love love love you guys sooooo much! Wish I had more time to write this week, but I promise I will next week. 
Dad, good luck with work man, you’ve got this! I believe in you! 
Mom, again, Happy Birthday! You have no idea how many huge parties you really do deserve Mom, (hint: it’s a lot). 
Lyns! You asked for some advice, and I wish I could be more detailed, but just make a plan of all the things you want to accomplish, when you want to accomplish them, and don’t go too hard or too easy on yourself, then just focus on every step one at a time, and make sure you stay happy and pray every step, just love it as it comes! 
Kait kait! Love you sis! I loved seeing our pictures together! Send me a Japanese word to learn! Big hug for my Kaitlin! 
Brendon, love you buddy. Go for it man! I love that we’re having such different adventures here. Really miss ya buddy. Congrats on the 6 month mark! It’s gonna be so fun to hang out together in a year and a half!

Lacey, I did get you card! Thank you so much! Loved it! And your letter! Hope all is well in your beautiful little fam. 
Jody! Thanks for the quick note! Good plan! I love you dearly my good aunt! 
Grandma Imogene, thank you for the letter and the update! 
Judith and Grandpa, thanks so much for keeping in touch and helping us out here! It really helps a lot! 

Well, wish I could have an hour or so just to write to each one of my relatives individually, but I guess it’ll have to wait until a calmer P-day… 

Have a good week everyone!
Love love and lot more! 
Tchau!
Elder Con

February 16, 2010 - Letter Home

Warm & Delicious!

Alright! Awesome! Ready to start writing today! Wow guys, how much I loved watching your vídeos. Serious. Dare I say it was even better than our Christmas phone call? It was pretty close to equally awesome, I’ll say. I was totally laughing out loud in the Lanhouse here. Whew. So awesome.
What I think is cool is that making a vídeo is relatively easy compared to a letter, but seems much more rewarding. Really, every P-day I could easily spend 10 minutes talking to a câmera. I don’t think it’ll be tôo difficult. So sweet.
I have a couple vídeos for you all here:

Boqueirao House Tour (part 1): http://www.youtube.co/watch?v=89D6ZGNalDg

Response Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXGRR7PMRLc

Sweet! All done in less than an hour! Hope you guys like it. One thing I want to do after talking to Mom is talk a bit more about the work and our investigators and everything. Very good Idea, very necessary, and I’ll have a vídeo about that next week. It’s always just a bit hard to focus on those things when your in your house on P-day, you just want to focus on other things. But it’ll be good.  Loved seeing my sweet Mom. Man it’s so awesome that we get to see eachother. Thanks so much for the vídeo.

 So I was praying this last Friday, not even about anything specifically related, when I got this awesome feeling that something awesome happened with Dad’s business. I’ve been holding onto this feeling for the whole week, trying not to doubt that it actually was an answer. Trying to use it to build my faith that something good happened. So I opened my e-mail with faith a couple hours ago knowing that I would get some good news from the home front. In the vídeo from Dad, what do you know!? Good news about the ------ account! It’s not Mr. Cluck’s Chicken, but it’s something! Awesome! Woohoo! I loved the news that something was finally working out. I know it’s not the end all to be all of all of our problems and concerns, but it sure is a start! I am SO HAPPY to hear this news! Parabens (congrats!) Dad! So awesome!

It was also very great to get some down to earth advice from Dad, I loved everything you Said buddy. I also really needed to hear many of those things. It’s something I am going through right now here in Brasil. Very cool. It meant a lot to me. For sure, knowing that I am a part of such a great family, knowing how fast time is going, and knowing how much really is possible, really inspires me to work harder and do better.

Man, Kaitlin and Lynsey together really are hilarious! I Love seeing you guys together, my little sisters! I think you guys are as funny in your music vídeo as in your normal one! Hehehe! But so cool to hear from you; I think it is a bit easier to Express ourselves when we are just talking. Cool. Maybe next time you guys could do some shorter, seperate vídeos? I know maybe there’s not a lot to say but even a little bit every week will really help.

Okay, so I’ve been fiddling around so much with the vídeos and stuff today, that I kind of ran out of room to type. Feel free to post the vídeos to the blog!
So I’ll explain this week quickly. We had a zone conference which was awesome, got our spirits up, ran out to work and tract the streets and get new investigators, had some success, got a couple new families, were feeling awesome... Then we got news that we needed to get rid of our current house, and go find another. And the job of finding a new house was up to us. So instead of tracting around to spread the gospel, we tracted around to find a new house. Sure we made contacts on the way but we kind of just got the steam knocked out of us because for 2 days we didnt really teach that much because we were trying to track down some news digs to live in for the next couple weeks. Then we had a bit of rain, which isnt impossible to work in but for sure is a bit harder.
Elder Lima and I had a couple of disagreements which definitely put a damper on things. Just overall pride on both our parts, I think. Dad, maybe you remember how it is to argue with me. I just don’t really ever give in our give up, right? Well, even with little tiny things both I and Elder Lima are willing to argue until someone gives in or gives up. We actually really like eachother, I think, but it’s this one little thing that we’re really trying to overcome. So we had another discussion in companionship inventory and for now we’re doing really good. We just have to be on our gaurd to make sure it stays that way.

After this little down period, we had some success yesterday, worked right in the rain, clapping doors and teaching some lessons. Right now we have about 8 different families we’ve only taught a little bit, but they have potential. We are going to continue to teach them and continue to add more people to our teaching pool.

A couple minor things that were interesting this week:
- I’m getting really good at clapping really loudly. (You don't ring on a doorbell or knock on a door, you stand outside and clap until someone comes out to greet you. ) There’s a technique to it, you know? You have to use cupped fingers of one hand on the palm of the other, with a slight whipping motion as you trap the air in the middle. None of this palm-on-palm stuff here. Cool.

- I made syrup. It turned out really good!!

- We played this ridiculous Brazilian game where you use your pointer and índex finger to slap the other persons fingers. You go in turns. Until someone gives up. Elder Lima and I played for seriously 40 minutes. We decided to leave it as a tié. I was sweating really bad afterwards. My two fingers are still way swolen even after a whole day. Not a good idea guys.

Brendon! Love you buddy! Seems like my transfer is going somewhat like yours! I don’t really know any advice to give, but man, spending a couple hours tracting really makes me feel like at least I did something, even on the off days. Go for it and make new contacts!

‘Kay guys! Until next week! Love Love Love!

Elder Con

P.S. By the way, I’m super dissapointed that no one is even guessing in my riddles. Okay, here’s another one for next week. Another opportunity for you guys. Find the Lost reference in this letter.
P.S. Tchau! Amor! Have a good week! Just be happy!

February 9, 2010 - Letter Home

Dry Spell

Wassup guys!

 

 "pancakes that Elder Lima and I made"

Man, this week has been a bit dry, and I don’t quite know what to write this week. To be honest, I know why. I got along so well, I think, with Elder Duarte, that the only things worth noting were good things, and I was able to tell and relate some funny stories. With Elder Lima, more often than not our stories together have been about how we’ve not been quite getting along together, or about how we are working on getting along together. Types of stories which aren’t very fun to read and aren’t very fun to write. So enough of that.

This week has been hotter than ever. It’s broken 40 degrees C here, which is about 105 Fahrenheit. Everyone at the CTM said that Rio Grande do Sul was going to be cold, the coldest place in Brasil. Man! On the contrary I believe. We are pretty much melting every day. What temperature is it over there in Maracanau, Brendon? Elder Lima says it’s way cooler there than here. But we’re drinking water at every single stop, taking water bottles with us, and that sweet handkerchief that Sister Harris gave us is really paying off here; a bottle of water in one hand and a handkerchief in the other to wipe the sweat. Thankfully yesterday it finally rained, and today has been very nice and cool and cloudy.

Man, I’m really having a problem relating anything interesting this week. How about on to all of your letters?

First of all loved Brendon’s video. Actually, I think we pretty much have the same accent, or are at the same level of fluency :). The accent is going to be the hardest thing to conquer, I think. I’ve really tried to get the gaucho accent down, but what is kind of weird here, or at least what my companions have said, is that the gaucho accent is regarded as somewhat of a hick accent in other parts of Brasil. I really don’t know what to do about this, so maybe parents, you can help me out. My companions want me to learn to speak as a Paulista (person from Sao Paulo), which is regarded as higher class, but also as foreign. I want to have an accent that shows that I learned how to speak with the Gaucho people, which will show others that I appreciate and treasure their culture. I’m pretty much alone on this opinion. But, what do you guys think? Imagine if a Brasilian missionary arrived in Texas, would you recommend that missionary to learn to speak in a Texan accent? I don’t really know how to answer that question.

But it was really cool news that Elder S Costa is returning to the mission! Yes, the mission is so awesome and so worth it. It’s been really difficult, but at the same time, just last night we had two awesome lessons with people off of the street, and you could tell that they were getting it, and they really expressed a desire to learn more. Sweet. :)

Good job on starting to read the Book of Mormon out loud in Portuguese! I really know that it works. See if you can catch up, I’m in Mosiah 6. ;) Man, if you thought reading Isaías in 2 Nefí in English was a dry experience, wait until you do it all in Portuguese. I used up a couple hours of P-day and just raced through it quickly, because I was absolutely dying every morning because it is so hard to understand.

But here’s another suggestion for study. I haven’t done it yet but I’m going to start tomorrow. Elder Anderson (remember him?) got transferred here three weeks ago, and we’re having a blast together, but he said he’s been writing in Portuguese, and having his companion check his grammar and sentence construction. My companion really thinks this’ll help me too. And if you look in chapter 7 of PME, Language Learning, it says to write in your language. So I’m going to try my hand at writing some Brasilian Mission-themed Poetry. :) I thought it’d be a good excuse for you to exercise your writing muscles. 30 minutes of reading, 30 minutes of writing. How about it? We can exchange our writings if you want. You just have to remember that the purpose is to learn grammar to use on the street and in conversations, therefore, it won’t be very useful to learn all of the vocabulary of a science fiction or fantasy story, because you probably wouldn’t use that day-to-day. But it might be fun.

Brendon, you didn’t take the challenge! Family, you also didn’t get the challenge. "The Searcher" was the ship that Penny (wife of Desmond) used to look for him in Lost. Why is this related to my letter? Because the ship was staffed by Brasilians, and I just so happened to have a picture of a Brasilian ship in my blog post! Okay! So I had another riddle this week but it looks like it’s not going to work because my video isn’t uploading.

Mom, the zombie kit was awesome. How about you use it as a Birthday present? Hehe, that was cool.

 (**from Kay Lea - it was a joke - a photo I found on the internet, there will be no "Zombie kits" for birthday presents)

 

  "the aforementioned fruit tree in our yard" (*See last week's post) Cool!

Mom, way to go on all the Relief Society activities! You seem to really be putting your heart into you calling. This is so important! So many people just wait for others to help them feel the spirit and help them stay firm in the church, and so much depends on those who actually go out and try to help those people. As we do more and give more in our callings, we will influence others to take our same course of action, and they will start helping others, and the work will go forward.

Bah! I’m so jealous about "Lost". I mean, I’m glad that it was awesome, but for some reason hearing about "Lost" just made me want to find it online and watch it already. But I resisted the temptation. Hear that Brendon? We have to keep from the spoilers together! I will as long as you do.

That is way sweet that you are so involved in everything Mom! You have a bunch going on! You sound like Lynsey :). It’s also so great that you and the “wives club” are supporting Dad and his partners in the company. You can really make a difference there.  I love you so much Mom. Thank you so much for keeping us updated. Your words have definitely lifted me up.

Grandma and Grandad sent an awesome letter too. Thank you guys. I love my Grandparents :).

Man guys, I had another video to send all of you, but YouTube is not uploading it. However, MyLDSMail is upgrading to use a specialized version of GMail, so I’m pretty excited that I’ll be able to send my videos to you directly instead of waiting for YouTube. Should work next week.

Man, I love you guys so much. I wish I had more to write, it’s been kind of slow here. But! Next week is going to be action packed. Let it be!

My Dad, keep going strong man. I believe in you. The only way to stay excited, stay energetic, and stay happy, is to just do it! Just start, right now, and feel that excitement for the next couple days of work you have before you. Heavenly Father will help you maintain this through prayer. I think it’s a type of faith. We can pray for blessings, and say to yourself, in your head, that they will be fulfilled… but at the same time NOT really believe that anything will change. We can want the blessings, we can ask for them, we can want the faith to believe that they will come, we can ask for the faith, but in the end it will come to our own little seed of faith. We NEED to make that small simple step. Once we inch forward and say, believing completely, “Yeah, those things really are going to happen, Heavenly Father will provide a way”, Heavenly Father will send the confirmation that our prayers will be answered. THEN we will say in our minds, “Woah! I know that those blessings will come!!! I had so much doubt before, but through the Spirit I have felt things that could not have come from any other place, and so I know that God is with me! Sweet! It’s all going to be okay! Awesome!” Of course, we all have to be doing our part, repenting for our mistakes, and relying on constant prayer to receive this, but I think we should not underestimate Faith. We can place wood and pour gas in the fireplace, and it’s a lot of work, but in the end we need that spark of faith. Do you believe? Just believe already!

Anyway, that’s how it’s worked for me and what I’ve understood about this. Don’t procrastinate setting this spark!

Lyns, keep going strong. Heavenly Father is with you. You can pray for comfort and for rest. Sometimes a sincere prayer is much more effective for your work and well-being than a nap or a couple hours of “me-time”. He will give it to you.

My Kaitlin! I am so happy I got your picture last week! I look at your picture almost every day! I love you my sweet Kate! I hope you are still working hard on your homework and on Japanese! Be happy okay my Kaitlin? Are you still saying your prayers? Have you tried to read the Book of Mormon every night? I love you so much my girl. Write me about some of the things that you’ve been doing recently.

Brendon, I love you buddy. Thanks for the video. Do you remember when I did that Game Jam thing at Santa Cruz? It’s already been a freaking year since then! It’s freaking me out how fast time went. Getting up to the 6 month mark! What the heck?!?! Love and live every day.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuVboNL_Vv4

Okay, my photos names were a little less creative this time. Sorry. Kind of rushed right now.

Um, this weeks riddle is "LonelyElder617". What and why? 1 point up for grabs!

Tchau tchau! Amor amor amor!

Elder Con

February 2, 2010 - Letter Home

"The Searcher"

"Procurando Por Almas" - (Seeking for Souls)

Hey Everyone!

Man, I really needed you guys this week. It was a bit hard. But you guys came through and my inbox was full and I even got some photos and man! I’m feeling good now! Thanks Dad, Mom, Lyns and Gram. Kaitlin too for being in the photos.

So listen, my bright idea this week was try to relate all of the information I had about the last week to you all via video! Sounds really awesome on paper right? I planned out what I wanted to say, and started the camera and went with it. Hmmm. I don’t think it turned out all that great. Definitely probably a lot like how Dad felt when he plugged in the camera and just started talking expecting to be perfect. It should be completely natural, shouldn’t it? Just like talking to you guys in person, I imagine. Unfortunately, I think the camera has the opposite effect for first-timers. I feel like I look slightly embarrassed and kind of befuddled in the video, but I hope you guys like it. I had the idea after Lyns said she wanted to hear my voice.

Hey it finished! I really don’t like this video, maybe it’s a little boring. Next time I’ll lighten up and make some jokes or something. I was a bit nervous to talk in front of the camera with everybody else in the lanhouse listening, so please bear with me as you watch. Here is the address: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaOo6TWf3To

Anyway, what is cool is that I recorded about 5 minutes of video, and YouTube uploads videos fairly quickly. I think I could go longer. I want to practice doing this, and eventually, maybe transmit everything via video. For now, though, I am going to go slow and practice. Eventually it’ll be just like I’m in the next room.

I kind of forgot about last week, exactly what happened. Here’s a couple of interesting things though: a member’s non-member husband, Geovene, offered us a ride home one night. We accepted. When we got in the car, started driving, and starting making a bit of small talk, we discovered he was pretty drunk. He even stopped driving for a minute to look down and grab a bottle of beer and start drinking more? We asked him not to drink, so he laughed, took a big swig and threw the bottle out the window of the car!!! And the car didn’t have seat belts! Holy smokes! I was so freaking scared, holding on to the sides of the seats, but luckily we got home safely. Luckily it was night and there weren’t many cars on the streets, but he did swerve a little a couple of times. Next time I’ll converse a bit before accepting a ride from a someone I don’t know!

Another experience was teaching a family, with a dad who didn’t have any eyes. Yep. I’ve never seen that before. Blind? Sure. At least they have eyeballs. But unfortunately this man had to have his eyes actually removed, I really don’t know why, I think it was because of cancer. So I tried to talk natural and teach as normal, but I really couldn’t help staring. It’s interesting: blinking is a habit we have, that I think we do automatically like breathing. Even with no eyes, he still had to blink. Can’t really get that image out of my head. Nice little story huh? Interesting what you see on the mission.

I’m doing really good. I think I’m pretty much totally used to being a missionary, and I’m happy. Elder Lima has been a good companion, although it’s been difficult. He’s never been a senior companion before so we’re kind of figuring it out together. But it’s been fun. I’m learning a lot faster with a companion who doesn’t speak English. I hadn’t spoken English for 2 weeks straight until today when we met up with some other American missionaries. Seriously weird.

So tonight you guys are going to watch Lost. Holy smokes I’m so jealous! Live it up. Man, it’s going to be hard to resist downloading the episode on iTunes and watching it during p-day. I am glad I don’t have the iTouch to tempt me into downloading it and watching it during the night or something. I want to let you know, Brendon, that I’m not watching it. Promise. Only 19 months until we get to watch it, man! Sweet. Anyway, have fun and do something special! Maybe invite Cody and Julie and Chase over to watch with you! I think the Nethercotts watch too, make it a party! Take photos and send them to me!

Dad, I love you so much buddy. I too am so very grateful to be a part of your life. I think I really took it for granted back home, and probably acted a couple of times like I shouldn’t have. Right now I just am so excited for the day when Brendon and I can return, help out with the business, and just go and chill, just us guys. We did that a couple of times (like when we went to Glamis for the last time) and man, I love those memories so much. But I think I’m going to enjoy those times with you much more in the future, for sure, because we’ll know somewhat how valuable it is. I love you Dad. You really are my hero. Work hard, but don’t forget to stop once in a while and realize all the blessings you have around you, and that you’re doing your best and the the Lord is going to take care of you and the fam. I know he will. Love you buddy.

Hey Mom! So cool about your study experience. Loved it. I’m going to study about stars tomorrow, I think. :) I’m so happy you’re continuing to be strong and do the right things. I’m so happy to have you as a mom. Elder Lima doesn’t have one, and as we’ve talked about our lives I realized how much of a difference you made in mine. So thankful you’re there to take care of the family. I love you lots.

Winter here is supposed to be pretty harsh, but luckily Elder Losee and Elder Duarte left thermal underwear, sweaters, coats, gloves and hats with me. So actually I think I’m pretty ready! What you could do for me though is send me my black hoodie. The one I always used to wear? I hope it’s not stuffed away where you cant find it. I think it’ll be good because it’s something I can wear on cold P-days and can sleep in comfortably (imagine sleeping in a suitcoat!). I already have my pajama bottoms and I’m waiting to be able to use them :) .

I’m really good. Healthy. Tan. Getting really really buff with this excersize routine every morning. Yep, watch out world.

I love you so much my mom.

Hey Lyns! Hope you liked the video. I made it because of your comment. Life is CRAZY!?!?! How could it be any different for my sweet sis? Man Lyns, the end of junior year was the year I stressed out the most, I think. Senior year was hard, but I’m pretty sure junior year was worse for me. You just got to remember to start early on everything, and get done early, and try to minimize time to have fun. If you do it early you’ll find you will actually have more time to have fun, because you won’t be stressing later, which often causes you to work less effectively, which means you have to work even longer, taking up time with friends. I know it sucks, but you’re gonna get through it sis! You’ve got what it takes. Don’t let up okay? You’ll get used to it.

I liked remembering about us playing at the stream and all of our other memories. Man. Awesome times. Those times were great, but we have much better ones coming up. I think it just gets better as time goes on. Many many more memories to go.

Hey, you can watch all of the seasons of Lost again if you want, but I want to let you know that we’re probably going to watch them all again anyway when we get back. I’m so jealous that you’re gonna watch the last season tonight. Holy smokes I just want to watch Lost. Gah! Ahem.

Lyns, I love you so much. Stay strong. Thank you so much for the letter and photos!

Kaitlin! I loved seeing you in the photos! You’re getting older! I can notice! Kait I hope school is going good and that your learning lots. How’s the Japanese going? Kaitlin, I have a couple of girls in our ward here your age that are going to write you a letter! In Portuguese! I’ll translate it first though, don’t worry. Cool huh? You can write them back if you want, and I’ll translate for you too. They are very excited to write to you, because they really like America! Kaitlin, I love you so much. Here is a huge bear hug! Can’t wait to see you again.

Hey Gramma Imogene, I love you. Thank you so much for the letter. Hope you next week is good. I’m staying healthy thanks to your vitamins! All the other missionaries are jealous. Can’t wait for your letter! Take care of the family, okay? And stay healthy too.

Okay guys, kind of short today. Enjoy the week! Enjoy Lost you lucky dogs!

As always, love love and more love!

Connor

"Boat Guy"

P.S. Oh yeah, the photos! Didn't know that there were missionaries serving on the high seas? :) (this is a monument in the center of Boqueirao, that commemorates the Portuguese settling the south of Brasil. Cool...)

P.S.S. 1 Point for anyone who can figure out why I chose the words in the subject line. Game on!

Okay Bye!