Brazil CTM

OIIIIIIIIIII FAMILIA!!!!!

Tudo Bem!

After 2 days of traveling, a broken plane, and a sketchy hotel room for the night, I FINALLY MADE IT TO BRAZIL!!! Please excuse my last email I was seriously on 2 hrs. of sleep for 48 hrs.! Hahaha.

Okay, so the Brazil CTM has ONLY 200 people here!! Its soooooo small! It’s like half Brazileros, and then Spanish speakers and Americanos! I love it so much! The food is seriously the best thing about this place! Oh my gosh seriously, I’m going to come home like 10,000 lbs.! I’ve already taught 6 lessons since getting here! My Portuguese is getting so much better! We committed both of our investigators to baptism so that’s super exciting! When we were committing our one investigator to baptism we asked him and he answered and none of us knew what he said... so it was super silent... ha-ha, then we realized he said yes and we all celebrated! Hahaha I love teaching! I’m in a trio now with Sister Belloumini and Sister Anderson! I love trios and I love them so so much! Seriously we are like sisters! Ahh!

Also my new teachers... I was worried they couldn’t top my Provo teachers but they’re pretty close! Irmao Mello is super crazy and funny we just laugh the whole class but it’s great! He’s Brazilian but served his mission in Colombia so he speaks Spanish and he speaks English too! He’s wonderful but when we’re teaching him he’s super tough, but that’s good for us!! Our other teacher, Irmao Pazini IS MY FAVORITE!! He’s from Brazil and SPEAKS ZERO ENGLISH!! So that’s crazy! But he teaches us grammar and we teach him some English words! Ha-ha he’s like our best friend. I learn so so much from him! They make us speak Portuguese ALL THE TIME!! It’s weird when we speak in English! We plan all of our lessons in Portuguese, pray in Portuguese, everything in Portuguese and were all picking it up so fast! It’s amazing!! O dom do linguas es real!!!!

Okay so for exercise time, it’s super fun! There’s this ghetto track in this alley way... ha-ha its hilarious... and we have to run 5 laps and then we can play volleyball or basketball! It’s so fun though! Ha-ha, we played volleyball against the Spanish district and it was so fun! We don’t know Spanish and they don’t know English so we have to speak in Portuguese to understand each other! It’s great!!! We also play basketball with our district! We are so so close as a district! We literally are family, and we love each other so much! It’s the best!

Oh also, across the hall from our classroom is a classroom of Brazileros who are our best friends now! We help them with English and they help us with Portuguese! It’s so great! And one of them is from Manaus! Ha-ha so great!!

Sundays here are great. We get free time which means NAP TIME!!! Sleep is very special here! Ha-ha

Also our devotionals are super good!! Sunday it was about doing what’s right, be more kind, be more merciful, be more forgiving, put behind you your weaknesses, go forth with new energy, be a little better, live the gospel more fully, serve with more diligence, have the self-discipline to stand a little taller, do what is expected of you! Be a better person, DO THE VERY BEST YOU CAN!!!

We were given everything from our Heavenly Father!!! Compared to what He’s given us, all we can give is pretty much nothing, so we have to give Him everything, we have to do our very best and commit ourselves 100%.

I got to go to the Sao Paulo temple today so that’s pretty cool!!! It was BEAUTIFUL inside and it was all in Portuguese! It was so great! I love the temple so so so so much and miss being in the temple twice a week!!

So when we got back from the temple we got off the bus and TWO ELDERS FROM OUR DISTRICT IN PROVO WERE THERE! SO WE RAN OVER AND HUGGED/SHOOK THEIR HANDS AND JUST WERE SOOOOO EXCITED TO SEE THEM!! THEN THEY TOLD US OUR WHOLE DISTRICT GOT THEIR VISAS AND WERE ALL HERE TOO!!! SO WE JUST HAD A GIANT REUNION WITH SO MUCH LOVE AND JOY AND SERIOUSLY I’VE NEVER BEEN SO HAPPY TO SEE THEM ALL! WE WERE SO LOUD AND THERE WERE TEARS AND WE JUST LOVE EACH OTHER AND MISSED EACH OTHER SO MUCH! I’M SOOOOO HAPPY WE’RE ALL TOGETHER AGAIN!! Oh except for one elder who’s still waiting... yeah that’s super sad... he is a solo elder in Provo now... with the Portugal sisters... poor elder... BUT HE’LL BE HERE SOON! AHHHH IM SO HAPPY!!!

After this I get to go out into the city and just wander! I’m pretty stoked! AND ON THURSDAY WE HAVE TO GO INTO THE CITY AND PASS OUT BOOK OF MORMONS TO PEOPLE!!!

Also sorry, no pictures here until the last p-day and we can’t send pictures home from here at all so you’ll have to wait until Dec 8!!

I love this place and can’t wait to get to Manaus! I leave Dec 8!! But I seriously don’t want it to come because I love it here so so much!

Also, every night at 9:00 they give us what’s called ‘lunch’. It’s like a little snack and it’s SO GOOD! BRAZIL IS THE BEST!!!!!!

Okay, okay! Until next week!!!

LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!

TCHAU!!

--Irma Huisken!!!