Last letter from Brazil! Adam comes home this Thursday at 9:10 AM!!! We are soooo excited to see him!!! :-)
Letter 6-22-09
the days are just packed...
well, we ended up baptizing neuza's son- evandro. nilzas husband won’t let her get baptized until next week. i went to juiz de fora this week and spent most of the other days in the other areas of my zone trying to secure baptisms in the zone. we ended up with 4. like everyone said, i guess i will see you guys this week. weird.
MOM- thx for the money- i didn’t know i would lose my wallet and all my money and the amount you sent helped us keep working hard this week.
DAD- i can’t wait to see the house. i can only barely remember it. i am pretty excited to see you guys too, i guess.
ALYCE- tell nathan i am pumped to meet him. elder silva thinks that i should just walk up and give his a kiss on the lips to break the ice. i am thinking about it... :) just kidding.
até logo!
love ELDER helland
mark 5:19
then luke 15:6
One last time…
i tried to confirm the time of my flight, but the office is REALLY busy with transfers and a hundred other HUGE changes in the mission. i guess I’ll get there when I get there.
Love,
ELDER helland
Monday, June 22, 2009
Monday, June 15, 2009
penultimate
Letter 6-15-09
i think that i will write a little next week. very little.
so this week was great. we found a lady, neuza, last week that went to church and she was baptized this week. it was great. her sister nilza went and we are going to try and baptize her this next week. a great story that i will tell in greater detail- in a week. :)
as for the information about my comps bank account, we will go to the bank today and get all of that. the need for the money got more important this week when i lost my wallet on saturday. somehow it fell out on the bus. a member of the church was on the bus and picked up the wallet later and gave it to the driver. today i will go to the office of the bus and see if i cant get it back. stinks, huh. i will send a little email later with the bank stuff and news if i got the wallet back or not.
1) [question - what do you want to eat when you get home] for food- i used to think about that sometimes- "man, when i get home i want them to have a pizza in the car for me"- and other weird things like that. Right now i am not really sure what i would want. ... actually the more i think about it, there is so much stuff that i would like to eat... i am up for anything really. if i used to like it, chances are that i still like it. i could suggest some things that i DONT want- spaghetti, rice, lasagna, ramen, :), and of course beans. :)
2) [question - anything else in particular you want regarding coming home - we're in the "catering to Adam" mood] not right now. i guess i am feeling pretty relaxed today. i dont have many ideas. i guess i am trying not to think about being at home too much. if anything comes to mind i will write you next week. right now, anything is great for me.
MOM= its funny that you mention elder everton. poor guy. i think that i went pretty hard on him. not excusing some of the dumb things that he did. maybe one of the great things that i have learned on the mission is how to manage problems and tough situations. i think if we were companions now, we would get along better, mostly bc i know how important it is to have a good relationship and how to have one. well i guess those experiences so long ago prepared me for others, just as tough in the future.
DAD- yeah, that elder is pretty pumped that the lakers won. kobe mvp. well that makes sense- that man makes the team. which, tying it in to the gospel, is something that i have learned these last weeks. one man can make a huge difference. for example: our misson pres got here and turned the mission around. not that i was bad before, but now it is so much better- growing everyday. another example: a missionary in my zone did a lot bad stuff, not like serious sins, but gossip and behavior stuff, and still i am dealing with the results of his actions two month ago. he complicated everything in that area for the missionaries. one man can make a huge difference. for the better or worse.
ALYCE: hope you don’t freeze your booty off [on the pioneer trek]. :) i am freezing mine every night here. i sleep in jeans and a shirt and a sweater because it is the winter here and our house only has two blankets and four missionaries. i only get to use my superman sheet to keep me warm at night. the sheet is worn pretty thin these days. on top of that we have to have fans blowing on us all night to save us from the mosquitoes.
well, i try not to think about you guys this week, but cant wait to see you next.
love elder helland
i think that i will write a little next week. very little.
so this week was great. we found a lady, neuza, last week that went to church and she was baptized this week. it was great. her sister nilza went and we are going to try and baptize her this next week. a great story that i will tell in greater detail- in a week. :)
as for the information about my comps bank account, we will go to the bank today and get all of that. the need for the money got more important this week when i lost my wallet on saturday. somehow it fell out on the bus. a member of the church was on the bus and picked up the wallet later and gave it to the driver. today i will go to the office of the bus and see if i cant get it back. stinks, huh. i will send a little email later with the bank stuff and news if i got the wallet back or not.
1) [question - what do you want to eat when you get home] for food- i used to think about that sometimes- "man, when i get home i want them to have a pizza in the car for me"- and other weird things like that. Right now i am not really sure what i would want. ... actually the more i think about it, there is so much stuff that i would like to eat... i am up for anything really. if i used to like it, chances are that i still like it. i could suggest some things that i DONT want- spaghetti, rice, lasagna, ramen, :), and of course beans. :)
2) [question - anything else in particular you want regarding coming home - we're in the "catering to Adam" mood] not right now. i guess i am feeling pretty relaxed today. i dont have many ideas. i guess i am trying not to think about being at home too much. if anything comes to mind i will write you next week. right now, anything is great for me.
MOM= its funny that you mention elder everton. poor guy. i think that i went pretty hard on him. not excusing some of the dumb things that he did. maybe one of the great things that i have learned on the mission is how to manage problems and tough situations. i think if we were companions now, we would get along better, mostly bc i know how important it is to have a good relationship and how to have one. well i guess those experiences so long ago prepared me for others, just as tough in the future.
DAD- yeah, that elder is pretty pumped that the lakers won. kobe mvp. well that makes sense- that man makes the team. which, tying it in to the gospel, is something that i have learned these last weeks. one man can make a huge difference. for example: our misson pres got here and turned the mission around. not that i was bad before, but now it is so much better- growing everyday. another example: a missionary in my zone did a lot bad stuff, not like serious sins, but gossip and behavior stuff, and still i am dealing with the results of his actions two month ago. he complicated everything in that area for the missionaries. one man can make a huge difference. for the better or worse.
ALYCE: hope you don’t freeze your booty off [on the pioneer trek]. :) i am freezing mine every night here. i sleep in jeans and a shirt and a sweater because it is the winter here and our house only has two blankets and four missionaries. i only get to use my superman sheet to keep me warm at night. the sheet is worn pretty thin these days. on top of that we have to have fans blowing on us all night to save us from the mosquitoes.
well, i try not to think about you guys this week, but cant wait to see you next.
love elder helland
Friday, June 12, 2009
Bird Poop In My Hair
Letter from 6-8-09 - Three letters behind...wedding planning has gotten the best of me...sorry! Less than two weeks til Adam comes home - yippee! :-)
Bird poop in my hair
if i could sum up this week in one word it would be: holy-cow!
for the mission counsel we did something different this time. like i said it was two days long- some of the best two days of my life :) the first day there was p-day. it was so cool: where president lives is a virtual paradise. we played soccer with president and the other zone leaders all morning. on the beach. by the tropical forest. the ocean has got these little tropical, tree covered islands all over the place. it was a blast. after running around in the sand for a few hours everyone was beat tired, so we went back to president’s house and ate lunch and watched a movie. (passage to zarahemla) then some of us went down stairs and played basketball until we could hardly walk anymore. then we took showers and changed back to church clothes and had "family home evening" at president’s house. it was really an all night fireside. we stayed there until 10pm. he taught about repentance, and then we did a cool activity with two talks by pres benson (some of moms favs): beware of pride, and cleanse the inner vessel. Then we went to the secretary’s house, in another paradisiacal place here in rio that is on the beach. President called us and told us that he was going to kneel down and pray and that he wanted us to kneel down with him and pray with him. He said that he would call and tell us to stop when he was done. And so we started to pray. We prayed and prayed. It was funny because we were all sleeping in the same big room on mattresses and bunk beds everywhere, the lights were off and everyone was kneeling on top of their beds praying. In less that 15 min somebody started snoring. Everyone giggled a little and then somebody threw a shoe at him. He woke up and continued praying. One by one as the minutes went by, missionaries gave up and fell asleep. Some of us solved the problem by changing the praying position every once in a while. Kneeling up, kneeling down, sitting in the Indian position, standing, or in the classic muslim praying position. That night i learned an important lesson: after playing soccer in the sand all day, i am no longer at the spiritual level of being capable of offering a meaningful, hour long prayer. :-)
i caught myself mostly praying that i could stay awake and that president would stop praying soon. :-) after a little more than an hour pres called. All jokes aside, it was a really neat experience, and the Lord talked to me that night too.
The next day we went to president’s house and had another day of learning. He gave a great talk of two hours about the “enemy of all men”, or satan. The best part of all the trainings that he does there is that he lets us ask any question that we want, about the theme. Then we had to deal with all the needs in the mission. After that president took us out to a nice rodizio de churrasco for lunch. It was the best.
MOM-
Regarding the debit card situation - the funny thing is that it stopped sometime in may. The diet thing was joke. I am still NOT fat, but that isn’t because i don’t try. It’s because i am always out of money and there is no food in our house- so i don’t eat as much as I’d like. As far a college goes- i plan on getting into debt anyway... so go forward and sign the contract to live with Caleb and Jimmy, even if it's more money than we planned. i don’t really know what i want, so, heck, why not. Lets go for it. Thanks for helping me get registered at BYU, apt., etc.!
I don’t really know why sis roberts emailed me. It didn’t say happy birthday. She said that she had been talking with some guy named brady that knows you.
DAD- PARABEMS happy bday pops. 42 now huh? Wonder what that feels like. Probably the same as 100. elder pili is so happy that the lakers are in the finals. I hope the magic win.
ALYCE- take it easy lady, cant wait to see you. Yesterday at church we had a cool lesson about thoughts. The teacher said that we cant control if a thought will come to our heads or not. It is like birds flying over our heads. We cant stop them. BUT we can keep them from landing on our heads. He compared it to BAD thoughts, but i compare it to thinking about going home. The birds keep coming. And every once in a while they even land on my head. (every Monday) but i am doing my best to keep them from building a nest.
LOVE elder helland
Bird poop in my hair
if i could sum up this week in one word it would be: holy-cow!
for the mission counsel we did something different this time. like i said it was two days long- some of the best two days of my life :) the first day there was p-day. it was so cool: where president lives is a virtual paradise. we played soccer with president and the other zone leaders all morning. on the beach. by the tropical forest. the ocean has got these little tropical, tree covered islands all over the place. it was a blast. after running around in the sand for a few hours everyone was beat tired, so we went back to president’s house and ate lunch and watched a movie. (passage to zarahemla) then some of us went down stairs and played basketball until we could hardly walk anymore. then we took showers and changed back to church clothes and had "family home evening" at president’s house. it was really an all night fireside. we stayed there until 10pm. he taught about repentance, and then we did a cool activity with two talks by pres benson (some of moms favs): beware of pride, and cleanse the inner vessel. Then we went to the secretary’s house, in another paradisiacal place here in rio that is on the beach. President called us and told us that he was going to kneel down and pray and that he wanted us to kneel down with him and pray with him. He said that he would call and tell us to stop when he was done. And so we started to pray. We prayed and prayed. It was funny because we were all sleeping in the same big room on mattresses and bunk beds everywhere, the lights were off and everyone was kneeling on top of their beds praying. In less that 15 min somebody started snoring. Everyone giggled a little and then somebody threw a shoe at him. He woke up and continued praying. One by one as the minutes went by, missionaries gave up and fell asleep. Some of us solved the problem by changing the praying position every once in a while. Kneeling up, kneeling down, sitting in the Indian position, standing, or in the classic muslim praying position. That night i learned an important lesson: after playing soccer in the sand all day, i am no longer at the spiritual level of being capable of offering a meaningful, hour long prayer. :-)
i caught myself mostly praying that i could stay awake and that president would stop praying soon. :-) after a little more than an hour pres called. All jokes aside, it was a really neat experience, and the Lord talked to me that night too.
The next day we went to president’s house and had another day of learning. He gave a great talk of two hours about the “enemy of all men”, or satan. The best part of all the trainings that he does there is that he lets us ask any question that we want, about the theme. Then we had to deal with all the needs in the mission. After that president took us out to a nice rodizio de churrasco for lunch. It was the best.
MOM-
Regarding the debit card situation - the funny thing is that it stopped sometime in may. The diet thing was joke. I am still NOT fat, but that isn’t because i don’t try. It’s because i am always out of money and there is no food in our house- so i don’t eat as much as I’d like. As far a college goes- i plan on getting into debt anyway... so go forward and sign the contract to live with Caleb and Jimmy, even if it's more money than we planned. i don’t really know what i want, so, heck, why not. Lets go for it. Thanks for helping me get registered at BYU, apt., etc.!
I don’t really know why sis roberts emailed me. It didn’t say happy birthday. She said that she had been talking with some guy named brady that knows you.
DAD- PARABEMS happy bday pops. 42 now huh? Wonder what that feels like. Probably the same as 100. elder pili is so happy that the lakers are in the finals. I hope the magic win.
ALYCE- take it easy lady, cant wait to see you. Yesterday at church we had a cool lesson about thoughts. The teacher said that we cant control if a thought will come to our heads or not. It is like birds flying over our heads. We cant stop them. BUT we can keep them from landing on our heads. He compared it to BAD thoughts, but i compare it to thinking about going home. The birds keep coming. And every once in a while they even land on my head. (every Monday) but i am doing my best to keep them from building a nest.
LOVE elder helland
24
Letter from 6-1-09 24
Sorry about the lame letter last week. The real problem is more of a time thing than interest. Lets see, what has been going on here…
My comp is elder silva. He is a chubby Brazilian from the extreme north of the country. He is pretty funny, I guess. He is in love with rock and roll; the extreme metal or grunge kind. (metallica, nirvana, ramstein, etc…) b/c of this he spends most of the day playing the air guitar when we are walking from one appointment to another. Weird, huh?
What else?... these last two weeks we have started an interesting set of activities in the zone. Maybe I will send the ppt that I sent to the president and the assistants detailing what we have been doing. It seems to be going well still. We are keeping a close eye on it.
Been a while since I have baptized anyone… we are working on that! Actually this last week we worked with some of the missionaries in the zone. One pair had three little girls that they wanted to baptize, so we went there this weekend to help out. Their mom wanted to let them be baptized, but the dad, a drunk, didn’t. we spent several hours talking with this man in front of his house until he gave in and let his kids get baptized. It was fun! He was really drunk and mean. He called us all bad names and stuff, but we just laughed with him and kept on pushing for baptism. It worked! We will most likely do the same thing this week. Gotta go where the baptism is…
Today I am going to Rio again for a mission counsel. My last. It will be cool bc it is going to be two days long. The first day will be a play day (sports and fun with president) and the next all business. Yipee.
MOM- sorry, not a lot to write. Got to work more. Almost out of time- and not just on the internet. The truth of the matter is that soon we will be able to chat. A lot. So hang on.
DAD- wish me luck. Tomorrow I am going to play tennis against the pres. Then soccer and basketball- I am coming home MVP!
ALYCE- man- you are going to make a weird adult. Usually when my stomach hurts it means that I am going to have diarrhea. And a lot.
Love elder helland
Oh yeah…
looks like you told everyone and their dog to write me something for my birthday :-) thanks! it was great to get b-day e-mails! i got emails from:
gma & gpa helland
aunt liz
anti and greg
nathan
gpa and nanny
kenny
and sister roberts? (wierd, huh...)
COMMUNICATED:
another thing of importance- My debit card hasn’t been working in the last couple of weeks. not that i am going hungry, well at least i am not getting fat, but i wanted to be able to buy some stuff before i go home. not a lot of stuff, just maybe some cds and a t-shirt. Can you please see what’s going on there for me? thx for helping me out.
Sorry about the lame letter last week. The real problem is more of a time thing than interest. Lets see, what has been going on here…
My comp is elder silva. He is a chubby Brazilian from the extreme north of the country. He is pretty funny, I guess. He is in love with rock and roll; the extreme metal or grunge kind. (metallica, nirvana, ramstein, etc…) b/c of this he spends most of the day playing the air guitar when we are walking from one appointment to another. Weird, huh?
What else?... these last two weeks we have started an interesting set of activities in the zone. Maybe I will send the ppt that I sent to the president and the assistants detailing what we have been doing. It seems to be going well still. We are keeping a close eye on it.
Been a while since I have baptized anyone… we are working on that! Actually this last week we worked with some of the missionaries in the zone. One pair had three little girls that they wanted to baptize, so we went there this weekend to help out. Their mom wanted to let them be baptized, but the dad, a drunk, didn’t. we spent several hours talking with this man in front of his house until he gave in and let his kids get baptized. It was fun! He was really drunk and mean. He called us all bad names and stuff, but we just laughed with him and kept on pushing for baptism. It worked! We will most likely do the same thing this week. Gotta go where the baptism is…
Today I am going to Rio again for a mission counsel. My last. It will be cool bc it is going to be two days long. The first day will be a play day (sports and fun with president) and the next all business. Yipee.
MOM- sorry, not a lot to write. Got to work more. Almost out of time- and not just on the internet. The truth of the matter is that soon we will be able to chat. A lot. So hang on.
DAD- wish me luck. Tomorrow I am going to play tennis against the pres. Then soccer and basketball- I am coming home MVP!
ALYCE- man- you are going to make a weird adult. Usually when my stomach hurts it means that I am going to have diarrhea. And a lot.
Love elder helland
Oh yeah…
looks like you told everyone and their dog to write me something for my birthday :-) thanks! it was great to get b-day e-mails! i got emails from:
gma & gpa helland
aunt liz
anti and greg
nathan
gpa and nanny
kenny
and sister roberts? (wierd, huh...)
COMMUNICATED:
another thing of importance- My debit card hasn’t been working in the last couple of weeks. not that i am going hungry, well at least i am not getting fat, but i wanted to be able to buy some stuff before i go home. not a lot of stuff, just maybe some cds and a t-shirt. Can you please see what’s going on there for me? thx for helping me out.
Just Pictures This Week
letter from 5-25-09 - Yep, I'm behind - what's new??? :-)
Dear Family,
I don’t have much time to write. But you guys haven’t been writing much either. I guess we all know that soon we can talk…
Here are some pictures:
.jpg)
my comp
.jpg)
.jpg)
Tres Rios
.jpg)
.jpg)
(cool shirt, huh!)
.jpg)
(in pink is the last person that I baptized here- milena) .jpg)
LOVE Elder helland
Dear Family,
I don’t have much time to write. But you guys haven’t been writing much either. I guess we all know that soon we can talk…
Here are some pictures:
.jpg)
my comp.jpg)
.jpg)
Tres Rios.jpg)
.jpg)
(cool shirt, huh!).jpg)
(in pink is the last person that I baptized here- milena) .jpg)
LOVE Elder helland
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