Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Its my birthday, I can baptize if I want to

Letter from 5-28-08 - (Sorry, Alyce and Jill were in Virginia and NYC for a couple weeks and unable to post Adam's letters!)

you would baptize too if it happened to you!! (i made up this pretty nifty song all by self, so... copyright, all rights reserved.-- [that must be the publishers version of calling "shotgun"])

Actually, for my big b-day, me and elder Rhodes did a division with some elders in our zone, and so I spent my b-day with elder nascimento. It was pretty cool. You know, we did the usual birthday stuff, knocking doors, talking to random people in the street, walking several miles in the scorching sun, … you know, partying all over the place! Just kidding, we did have a good family home evening with a few families in our ward and they invited their friends over for us to teach and then they made a cake for me and everyone sang and stuff. It was really cowabunga! (can I use it like that?) Then yesterday we had another family home evening with Irene’s family, (remember they are all strong members), and they invited our investigators too. They made a cake for us, and Irene gave us presents. She made each of us a box. Pretty cool, huh! No, just kidding, but it is a box, I just don’t know how to describe it. I will take a picture of it and send it to you guys next week. I thought it was really sweet. Irene really loves us and would do anything for us. She is such a neat lady. It is weird to think that she will always remember us, that we have truly made a difference in their family.

It was a awesome birthday, all things considered.

Anyway, so far I have got a package from jay and elle and a package from alyce. but don’t worry, we have interviews next week on Friday, I will probably get the others then.

THIS WEEK IN INVESTIGATORS:

Well, the one family that I told you about, they talked to their pastor instead of to God and he told them some ridiculous stuff about us. When we told them that that stuff wasn’t true they got all confused, not knowing who to believe, us or their pastor. I guess part of the problem is that if they leave their church, the pastor will be REALLY mean to them and say bad stuff about them to the congregation, and then all of the neighbors won’t like them anymore and they will lose all of their friends. And here it isn’t like there, where if things are bad you can just move. People live in the same house for GENERATIONS, so pretty much the pastor made a pretty big threat to them, without actually threatening them.

We also found a whole bunch of new investigators, but no one that is going anywhere fast. I will give the update on the ones that make through to next week.

MOM-
Yes I can watch DVD’s, for crying our loud!! I can watch almost more movies here ON the mission than you let me watch before!! (he he he… I am kidding, but not entirely)
Nope, we didn’t catch the rat. We decided on the more practical route later in the day. (it was elder Rhodes idea, I thought the idea of a sweet rat trap made of the garbage that we have at home was a great project) we ended up just cleaning the house real good and then putting cardboard under all of the doors to keep the rats out. We still built the trap, but… the trap went off unexpectedly and broke our clothes iron. I guess that is just the way things go. Well, no I didn’t have the same SS class as you guys. I taught the GP class instead. (Gospel Principles) we talked about faith. I think I did a pretty good job though, because this time elder Rhodes wasn’t in the back laughing at me. (we trade off every Sunday for who gets to teach the GP class.)

DAD: what?!? 5 temples ????? that is almost as many as brasil!! I had heard about the other two already. Last transfer we had 3 other missionaries in my zone from mesa and Gilbert; they called me Elder West-side. That was cool, b/c that was all of the missionaries from Arizona in our mission in the same zone.

ALYCE: WHAT!!!! Going on a date w/a returned missionary!!!!! I thought that I made the rules clear that you were not even to TALK to boys for two years!!! Just kidding. What I meant to say was … cowabunga. Was the Indiana jones movie cool? How about prince caspiean? I don’t think either have been translated into Portuguese yet, or at least, I didn’t even know they were coming out!! Well, you are old now too! No more school. Do you remember when we used to dream about the day there would be no more school? Not as fun as we thought it would be, huh. I remember that I used to think that the mission would be good because I wouldn’t have to go to school everyday. The mission is WAY better that school, and I am learning way more. Well, stay away from that hicky boy at work.

Until next week, adieu.
love
Elder Helland, 20 years old

Ooone MOOOrrre thing...
(that one old guy in jackie chan adventures)

tell kory "hi" for me, and that: "ele é o cara, e que eu tenho tanta saudades
dele. "

Regarding the mission council picture:
man, i look dumb!! well, i guess that is just the way that i look. ... wait a minute... that is YOUR fault! yup, it is your funny look'n genes that made me this way. humph! now looking like a goof ball is an entirely justifiable complaint.

ps "conselho da missão" is code for mission council. or is it counsel? man i feel like alyce. ... dang, how IS IT SPELLED? grrrrgh!! oh well, i don’t need that pathetic language right now anyway. portuguese is WAY superior!



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