It has been a rough week
adjusting to the new climate (e.g., wet snowing below zero Fahrenheit [in Tennessee before I left] to humid
50 degrees Celsius [in Brazil after I arrived]). I have been taking
two showers a day - one in the evening
after a day of walking in the hottest place I have ever been in my life and one
in the morning after sweating like crazy in bed, even though I have a fan and
am not using any blankets whatsoever.
I got to Sousa from Natal around
5pm. [Thursday]. I'm walking
everywhere. I'm wearing leather shoes
mostly but today I'm trying out my crocs.
There is another companionship that lives in our house, so I have 3
roommates. Only one speaks English. The other two are from Brazil, including my
companion. The only English she knows
is, "I testify..." [I’m] speaking
Portuguese 24/7. Actually I had to get
up in Sacrament meeting yesterday and bear my testimony (in Portuguese of
course). It went well (I received a lot
of compliments afterwards and my sweet companion kept telling other people how
well I did). Maybe too well, because
afterwards our Branch President, Presidente Sacramento, said he was thinking about
asking me to give a discurso (talk). It
is now kind of weird when other people speak to me in English. I always reply in Portuguese.
It has been a pretty crazy
week. I have learned a lot of new things. For example, in Portuguese the word
for coconut is "Coco" while the word for poop is
"Cocó". Don't want to get
those two mixed up. We actually live by a Rio de Cocó. It doesn't smell too bad. It just doesn't
look to good. It's green.
Sousa is pretty big. At least the area is. We have 4 Ultimo Elders (1 is new like me and
is from Curichiba). He had his first
baptismo yesterday! I didn't get to see
it, but in Sacrament Meeting he was sitting with the little boy he was going to
baptize and he let him wear his tie when he found out that the little boy
didn't have one. So cute! [The Elder] put on the white tie he was going to wear during the batismo.
The church here is
beautiful! It almost looks like a
temple. And it is the place where all
church members hang out during the week.
My health is great. The food
is good. At every meal I've had at
someone's house so far, we have had rice, beans, spaghetti with salsa, some
type of sausage, and juice. Guarana soda is awesome. Also, they have really good juice here, but
they also have very different fruit that I don't know the names of. Guava is actually pink on the inside here.
Sister Dyer, Sister Acosta, and
Sister Vilanova at bus station in Natal
They do have [certain imported
and other products] here. They just come in small packages and are very
expensive – same with peanut butter. I
brought 3 things of peanut butter.
Yesterday the Elders in our branch called Sister Acosta and I and asked
us if we could bring them some food. We made them some toasted peanut butter sandwiches
brought some cookies, and cold juice. They
couldn't thank us enough.
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