Language barrier

So another transfer rolls by and I am staying in Vista Alegre. I will complete my 6 month mark here now, because It´s gonna happen this transfer. That concept just absolutely blows my mind. Especially since last week there was a decent level of people who can´t understand a word that I am saying. It was a humbling week as far as the language goes, because I can understand everyword everyone says, my comp can understand me perfectly, but people and I have a brick wall between us called ``the accent.´´ sometimes I´m fairly confident that my toungue was not meant to roll or make latin noises, but self pity never helped anyone so I just find ways to enjoy it when people are openly mocking me because they think I can´t understand them. It is pretty funny sometimes the things people will say in front of your face when you are foreign. But whatevsss

This week we had some pretty good thunderstorms. The thunder and lightning combo here is different. The thunder rolls really powerfully for like 15 or 20 seconds straight, and the lightning never strikes the ground. It like the clouds are just really angry. Also the lightning is pretty weird because it´s a really bright pink. I´m thinking that is because of the rediculous level of pollution, but who can really say. But early in the week we got stranded a few miles from home in a torrential downpour, and my companion didn´t bring his umbrella. So i gave him mine and just enjoyed the day soaked. It was fun because for the first time it was legitly large raindrops, none of that mist crap that it´s been making as of late. And as we were walking to our next comitment and crossing rivers in the middle of the street, I was thinking of how lucky it is that I have a name tag over my nip, because white clothing being soaked isn´t super modest. But then I saw the other side. so i just used my backpack straps to conceal that side. But then I realized my bellybutton was showing through and just gave up. It was good times and really refreshing.

The next day we were eating lunch at a members house that lives in the middle of no where, and had to walk a couple miles to a bank afterwords to get our money. The bank is really close to our chapel, so I thought, ``oh i´ll just use the bathroom in the chapel´´ and we left the members house. When I left the members house I didn´t really need to go that bad, but by the time we were getting close to the bank I was dying. In the bank I withdrew my money real fast and paced in circles waiting for my companion becuase if I stopped moving it was over. Luckily for me (sarcasm) his card wasn´t working. So I continued to pace... started to worry... started to panic... and made a break for the bathroom in the bank. The reason I was avoiding the bathroom in the bank, is because it´s a huge hassel. The bank has 2 sections, and one just has ATMs. The other is behing bulletproof glass and it´s like going through airport security, except with more guns. So i bust through there and asked a guard where the bathroom was. Seeing my panic, he pointed me in the right direction luckily and waived off the other guards, but told me I had to find the employee that has the keys to the bathroom. I have no idea why they have a locked bathroom, in a secured guarded room, but they do. So I am quickly running out of time untill I pee everywhere, and I find the guy with a key, but he´s on the phone. I just interrupter him and luckily he was a member. The next/last obstacle was the locked door. As I struggled with the key, I lose all hope and will to keep holding. My body began to rebel. and as the door to the bathroom opened I simultaneously wet myself. Pretty good timing if you ask me. The Irony of a clean toilet staring me in the face as I peed my pants 2 feet away just made me laugh. So we went back to the house on a crowded bus and I got to take 2 showers that day. what a blessing.

In an unrelated note I made the best pancakes ever. Syrup that I derived out of fresh coconut water, and pineapple inside the pancakes. Pina Coladaaaaaaaa pancakessssssssssssss!!!!!!!! It´s really good.

But yeah just that. Not to worry, we never talked to the macumba people. Everyone who knows me knows that I´m afraid of the dark, so dark magic is something I´ll avoid with certainty.

Frosting explosion in Birthday Package from mom

Macumba!?

So this transfer is coming to a close, and I am hoping that I stay here. I NEED to keep working with this guy that I´ve become pretty attached too, because he is so close to being 100% sober. He already quit drugs, drinking, and is just trying to kick cigarrets now. His relationship with his family is way better now, he´s no longer worshipping/making animal sacrfices to satan (he practiced a form of ``christian black magic´´ kind of like voodoo, but different called macumba) and his relationships with his family are so much better now. He is trying to find his 5 kids that are scattered through brazil and help them out in their lives and, the biggest difference, he smiles a lot more. One of a few cool people that I get to work here.

But I have a list of things that I need you guys to help me out with

FIRST: somebody send me a recipe of really good cream based italian sauce to put over noodles.
SECOND: someone needs to look into the hoops I need to jump through to be a translator at the world cup here in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016. I heard that you can start filling out papers for some of that stuff in february but I´m clueless, so someone look into that.

those are the only ones that I can remember for now

But hey, I hope mom only sent 10 dollars in that cake box, also I hope she is remembering to fill my toolbox with magic instead of wasting a ton of money on postage... After seeing some of the funny cars and motorcycles that people create out of scrap I am getting some funny ideas that I can realize if I have the right tools.

But some quick stories from this last week, we were knocking doors the other day and every one here has an outer wall and a gate. Sometimes you have no idea what the house looks like because they have a 12 foot tall concrete wall and a huge metal door with a little telephone box to call to the house and a camera so they can see you. So we call a house and it´s a lady who says she´ll be right out. As soon as she hangs up this guy bursts out the gate and he´s got crazy eyes like a crack addict. But so does everyone else, so whatever. I asked him if we could talk with his family about our message, and he was like ``uhhhh... just that everyone here are macumbeiros... is that okay?´´ Like I said, macumba is a voodoo-ish thing that they´ll use to summon demon powers in their life. It´s weird though because generally their houses are just FULL of pictures of saints and such, but really dark pictures and their houses are dark too. So my companion got freaked out and started leaving, but I was like ``it´s all good dude, can we come in?´´ and he accepted. The whole time my companion was trembling with fear, but nothing happened that was super out of the ordinary. They did have a parrot that was talking to me non-stop, and the house was a little weird, but overall it was cool and we´re going back to teach again this week. They all had long sleeves on so I couldn´t really see if they had any markings of macumba, because generally they´ll have all these raised slashes over these crazy looking tattoos because they´ll sacrifice animals and cut the blood into their skin during their rituals. Kinda weird, but I have a higher authority, soooooooooo too bad for them. Next time should be a hoot.

Beyond that life is just rolling along. I love everyone at home, so keep it classy and have fun. latersssss

meow meow‏

haha I got a package, and I´ll try and send a picture of it. We´ll see... But the moral of the story is that I got it, made a cake, and ate it. BRITHDAY!!!111! I know I mispelled that, but it´s funnier to me that way.
So anyways, this week I found some more lobsterclaw people. One dude has a hand that is more of a lobster claw than any that I´ve yet seen, but also I found a curveball - A worm hand. Just one big ol´ finger with like 6 joints. It had a huge fingernail at the end, and no palm. That one was really cool because it was wriggling around in circles while he talked. Needless to say I was entranced and that I got lost in thought for some time.
Agh I think the attachment failed. Maybe next time. The computers here are less than desireable for anything more than ``command prompt´´ but whatever for now.
But going back to the worm hand, sometimes I get lost in self narroration (spleleeling?). I feel like wishbone the dog from the old TV show about classical novels and the dog that imagines himself into the story. Everyone here is in funny costumes and I just feel like my life isn´t real sometimes. The other day we were just walking down the street and a car pulled up and it was our bishop and stake councelor. next thing I know we were talking some kid out of a suicide attempt. Like things just happen and it´s not a huge deal, because they happen pretty regularly. Even weirder than that is we always know exactly what to do after a few minutes of being really freaked out by some of the things we run into.
It´s just weird to go into everyday knowing you are going to do stuff beyond your own capacity.
But it strengthens the testimony too.
BBuuutttt anyways I got the package. The frosting exploded everywhere in transit, but I scooped it out and used it anyways. I cooked the starburst into some pancakes and it was suprisingly similar to eating them with raspberries. And I got grandmas package too.

I love you all and I want to say so much more but I have no more time. maybe next week? haha
laterssssssssssssssssssssssssss

20 years WHAT?!‏

holy cow... 20 years old.

So I only have 10 minutes or so, so here we go. The funny thing that has been happening this week is the fact that even for a brasilian my companion is pretty back-woodsy. He doesn´t have a lot of education, saw his first computer when he put in his mission papers, etc. So needless to say, sometimes funny things happen.

For example, the other day we taught a guy who has cancer. São Paulo, being a city with 20 million people is pretty advanced, and with free healthcare he was telling us about the cancer treatments and such. But when we left my companion was so scared he was almost shaking. He was like ``elder, we have to go home and wash our hands´´ and I was like ``no way dude. why?´´ turns out he is convinced he can get cancer like you get the flu or a cold. So even today he´s pretty nervous. I tried to explain but he doesn´t believe me. Also he things I might get sick soon, because I had my pancakes with COLD milk. Cold + Hot in you stomach at the same time = sick. Haha. Endless entertainment.

Other than that I don´t really know. everyone calls me german, which is their term for ``whitey.´´ Someone asked me if I was albino, but also I´m looking pretty german as I lose weight. I´ll show you what i mean next time, But for now I need to run. I love you all. later

Week two of natives‏

This week I had a blast. My companion is technically the senior, and although he likes to work hard, he has issues with talking to people sometimes because of fear. So I just have been showing by example how to do tons of stuff when the you have never seen it done in your native language before and you have to go do it in a language that you´ve ALMOST been trying to speak for 4 months. It´s so much fun, because I have a command from God to go do these things, so the level of help I receive in the moment is tremendous. Lots of really cool slash funny experiences

For example, we were talking to a man in the street and he said that he didn´t beleive the Holy Ghost was present on the earth anymore. The words I used to explain to him are not in my vocabulary, so that was neat, but also I just randomly said, ``These things can only be known through experience, and you are going to get your experience right now. Listen to your heart as I say what I´m about to say.´´ And I randomly started to bear my witness to him of the devinity of Christ. I didn´t even know what was going on, but my mouth just kept going. The guy was speechless afterwords because he could no longer deny the reality of our teachings and he just got really mad. Pretty neat but sad that he just got angry. whatevs, maybe another day for him.

Also we were giving someone the gift of the holy ghost after baptism, and the bishop asked him who he wanted to do it, and he pointed to me. Great. But it happened, and again the power and authority that I represent was manifest. Sometimes, I feel kind of inadequit to walk the streets with this kind of calling, but I´m here and it´s very real, so that´s cool.

In an unrelated note, everytime I hear reggae like music I want to grab a guitar or ukulele sooooo bad. That is one of the first things I´m going to do when I get back. Blahgh. I don´t have a lot of time today... but I want everyone at home to know that I love them. I am doing good, and I don´t think I would trade places with anyone else on earth right now. Sometimes I go to sleep wanting to just quit and cry mself to sleep because of the level of stress I feel for other people I´m trying to help, but this work is so fulfilling. Brazil is pretty cool too. But keep it classy at home, and maybe I´ll send you guys a picture of something weird next week. Gotta run, so see ya.

New companion

Welp, I gots me a new companion. Of course it´s my luck that he´s a native brasilian. There is good and bad in this. I only speak portuguese, day, night, always so that´s cool. I have trouble getting my mind going int he morning because I still dream in english for now, but I am learning a lot from him. The bad is that, like many new missionaries, I liked my trainer more. The cultural differences that are present are hilarious as long as I remember just to laugh, but really frustrating and annoying if I don´t remember that.

But I wanted to take the advice of David Scott and many others and just destroy my negative feelings toward him with service. So I woke up the first day and made him amazing banana pancakes, american style, with my precious store of real store bought mrs. butterworth´s maple syrup that I got out from another missionary. It´s approximately a year old, but it´s still got some flavor to it. but anyways, I made him a big ol´ pancake, cooked with love and lots of butter, with the perfect amount of sugary elixer, and he accepted saying ``oh cool, I´ll eat it soon.´´ Well he made some chocolate milk for himself, ate some bread and then stared at it for a while. It was cold by now. So he put it in the fridge. I ended up eating it that night because he was like ``oh I´m starving´´ and I responded with ``oh cool, you still have that pancake.´´ and he ate a slice of plain bread instead. It´s cool though because it was surpisingly good after a whole day in the fridge. The syrup absorbed in and crystalized a little. mmmm...

I am making a lot of french toast that he won´t eat too. And I decided this is actually such a blessing, because I get all the pancakes and french toast that I can make. I think I´m gonna make a thing kind of like flan too, but we´ll see if he´ll eat that.

It´s cool though because I am learning a lot about how to look to the best part of someone. I´ll ask him questions to break the silence like ``so what did you like to do before the mish?´´ and he´ll answer ``work.´´

``Oh cool, but what did you do with your friends...?´´ ``I don´t have friends. I work.´´

The thing he does like to talk about is when he might recieve a leadership position. Topic of choice for brasilian elders: how if you´re a leader your a better missionary. I thought about opening the scriptures to slam this concept, but whatever. No need. I can´t even hardly speak portuguese, let alone teach him life lessons. I´ll just continue to eat my pancakes. I am however reading the book that the church uses to help people with addiction recovery, ``he did deliver me from bondage.´´ I think it would be a testimony building for anyone, having an addiction or not, and being a member or not. It´s good for me because I´m addicted to not liking my companion, so I´m applying it as best as I can and trying to kick that habit. Let´s see what happens... haha.

But I am jealous of the Denmark gang. I was sure that I was going to serve up in that area, speaking ``blingen-blurgen´´ but whatevs. Brazil is honestly so fun. I read a scripture today that I can´t recall off the top of my head, but you guys can look it up. D&C 59:18-20. Talks about the stuff that we have here on the earth like the animals and the trees are here because our Father in heaven gave us stuff to please our eye, just so that we could be happy. I know that sounds really granola-ey, but hey that´s me sometimes. I went out to the anterior of the city to find a someone out into the jungle and it was soooo quiet. In the city something is always happening, but in the trees there was just me, my comp, and lots of cool stuff to look at. The earth is really such an amazing place that we don´t get to experience very much because we have a lot of stuff to worry about. Walking through that jungle and seeing people who don´t have a whole lot of worry even though they don´t have a whole lot of money was an interesting experience, especially because they make this really good juice out of sugar cane. Really, really tall sugar cane.

But anyways, love you guys. I hope someone sends me maple extract in abundance. For now I am using sweetened condensed milk, or home made caramel, or brigadeiro, or whatever else I think of / make. The people here are really cool. Everyonce in a while I teach someone or go out and find someone to help them, and the changes that occur are heart-deep. Their eyes have a new light. Who can really say, but I think I´m seeing life long changes. Keep it classy at home, and always remember, this is my hat now.

this is totally my hat.

I think I just ran over a small bus,
Scott