And this week begins week 7. Chicka-whaaa?! Yeah, three more weeks and I´m outta here!
Some business really quickfor anyone reading the blog:-If you send me letters, be sure to put the return address on the back. That´s just how they do it in Brasil.-Though it only takes a week from the US to get here, it takes 3-4 weeks for a letter from Brasil to get home--if you´ve written me, I´ve written you back. Patience =]
Well, this week has certainly been full of adventures.Last Wednesday we had to go to the Federal Police to get finger printed for one reason or another. So now the Jordanian and Brasilian governments have my prints on file. Good fun, huh? It was nice to get out of the CTM though! And we ran into some of the Elders in the São Paulo Leste missão who have been out a year, way cool to chat with them. It gave us all hope that we´ll be fluent in a year, hahaha.
I also got my second Hep A shot. I mean, Brasil is a pretty advanced country and everything... But everytime I get a shot I think about Ebola and how it spread through needles in hospitals... and my nurse giving the shot didnt change her gloves.... But I haven´t started breaking out in a weird rash or experiencing internal hemorraging, so I think I´ll be okay =D
We went proselyting again on Friday! We actually ran into a couple guys we had met last time and they commented on how much our Portuguese had improved! Ótimo! We gave out 7 Livros de Mórmon, and it was muito bom. The area presidency or someone decided we as missionaries can´t use pass-along cards anymore--they´re just for the members. So we only had our Livros to give out. I feel like we actually talked with and got to know the people better. There were a few people who listened and talked to us and said no, but people here in Brasil are SO polite. If someone who could barelyspeak English came up to someone in a park in America and tried to talk to them about Jesus Christ, you can bet 99% of the people wouldn´t give them the time of day. But it´s the opposite here. And it also helps being two young pretty American girls ;) No wonder Sisters get in places Elders can´t! But it was a good experience, and I was just so happy to be out there. There was a moment when we were heading back to the van that I looked at everyone around me and just had the thought "They are all children of God" and I just felt so happy and warm inside =D God loves everyone, regardless of who they are or where they live. He understands their struggles and rejoices in their successes. What an amazing thing to know and to share!!!!
Today we went to the São Paulo temple again. Funny thing happened on the way there, that is just soooo Brasil. Our big bus is cruising down the highway, and we pass this accident on the side of the road. Then, our bus pulls off to the side and we see this guy standing there like he´s waiting for us. Our bus driver opens the door, then GETS UP AND WALKS OFF THE BUS! Then this other RANDOM guy that we seemingly just picked up off the side of the road, gets in and drives (quickly!!!!) the rest of the way there. HOW RANDOM! We were all like "What the hey diddle?!" and one Sister commented "Is it that easy to kidnap a bus of Mormon missionaries?". But luckily, I think the Lord isn´t going to let a bus of His missionaries come to any harm =]
Other random fun things:-The word for braces is "apareçho"
-An Elder in our district was talking about Chastity and started reading a scripture about Charity, substituting the word charity for chastity (Moroni 7:45)--SOOOO Funny!
-One of the Elders in our district could NOT say "wolf". He would say either "woof" or "wolv" and oh man, we just laughed about it for a week. But he practiced and now he can say it =] Good job Elder!
-All of the Brasilian elders call me Sister Wilkson. I dont get it. It´s phonetic. Why can´t they get the middle syllable? But i respond to it, so tudo bom, não?
And now, your weekly scripture reading! Alma 5, especially verses 33-35, and 43-49. AMAZING!!!!
Love you all!
~Sister Wilkinson
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
A little note
It takes about 3 1/2 weeks for a letter to get from Basil to the US, though only a week from the US to Brasil
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Eu amo o Brasil!
Here´s the Haps for the last week:
Oh, so much to say, and these Brasilian keyboards are funky.
The plane ride was boring: no music, no movies, and I got approximately.00847363 hours of sleep. On the bright side, I did give a Livro de Mormon to the Brasilian guy sitting next to me. We had a great conversation actually, even in my broken Portuguese, about the gospel and stuff. I pointed out 3 Ne 11 and the introduction and Moroni 10:4-5 to him, and he asked if it was the word of God. I told him that yes, it is the word of God, and that he can pray to God to know like I did. He read through a bit of it and told me he felt like it made sense in his head and in his heart. It was just an all around good experience.
We landed in São Paulo and I sheperded 17 Elders through customs and then there was some confusion as to who was picking us up, and then a couple of us apperantly had our passports stamped wrong, but all was figured out and we were off!All I have to say is Eu amo o Brasil! (and yes, you need to spell it with an S) That means "I love brasil!" From the moment I stepped out of the airport, i fell in love. As we drove from the airport to the CTM, various elements of São paulo reminded me of other places i´ve been, like Amman and Mexico and a little bit of India (open sewer lines, anyone?), but cleaner, and smells better. And Brasil just has... it~s own rhythm, it´s own... sabor (flavor). I can´t quite describe. But I love it.
The CTM is much smaller than the Provo one (duh). It´s more like a family than a facility. It also has a super high tech security system invented by Israelis. Combine that with the Lord´s power and no one is going to hurt us! There are only 46 sisters here, and only half are American. It´s so much fun to sit with the brasileiros at mealtimes and practice speaking with them. They´re supposed to try and learn English on their missions, and it´s just way fun teaching them cool words and learning them. Some favorites:
brincaderia--just kidding
smagar--to smash
namorado--boyfriend (you hear that one a LOT around here, or namorada, which is girfriend)
My companion is Sis Campbell. We´re getting along pretty well =] Our roommates are two brasileiras. We´ve had a lot of fun adventures with communicating with them. One of the funniest is when Sis de Jesus was showing us a picture of her boyfriend and said (in portugues) "This is my boyfriend" and then something else we didnt catch, so she repeated it and pointed to her hand. we were like "is he married? has a ring? huh?" and finally I was like "He doesnt have a hand?" and we were like nooo, that can´t be it, that´s way too random... but that´s EXACTLY what she was trying to say! It took us 10 minutes to figure it out, hahaha. But how random is that? "this is my boyfriend and he only has one hand"... yeah. But they´re fun and I can tell already my portuguese is going to improve so much from it. My acting ability even moreso; I´m going to be a master Charades player when i get back!
We made friends with two brasilian elders that we sit with a lot at meal times; elders vargas and lima. Elder Lima knows quite a bit of english, Elder Vargas just nods and smiles and gives us the thumbs up. But with the portuguese I know and, again, lots of hand gestures, i can usually get the point across. They´re way fun and we´ve learned some fun words from them. They also enjoy getting me to try and pronounce "-ão" correctly, because apperantly I can´t get it to sound like QUITE like a native, though I´m ALMOST there. Bah. Oh well, that will come in time, não?
This week has mostly been spent in the class room. We live there. We only take breaks for meals and for an hour of gym. Our teachers are great. They´re all native brasilians, and they´re hilarious. Our teacher in the morning just teaches us funny things, but they´re only funny in portuguese... I would try to explain, but you have to hear it. So maybe in a year and a half. My Portuguese is improving rapidly. Even with my spanish background and knack for languages, I´m picking it up waaaay faster than I should. I can tell the Lord is blessing me. And I love learning all the doctrine. The gospel of JEsus Christ is so beautiful because it´s so deep but so simple. Go read Preach My Gospel chapter 3: Lessons.
This friday we´re going prostelying out on a street in São Paulo. Yes, they take us out for 4 hours and we have to talk to people and give out pass-along cards and everything. Crazy, não? I´ll let you know how that goes.Today we went to the Campinas temple--gorgeous! It was mostly in English. Way cool. It was nice to get out, though I got a little sick on the bus.
I wish I could send you pictures, but we´re not allowed to take our cameras outside the CTM. Safety issues. Smart, but inconvenient. I will eventually, I promise =] Write to me! Pray for me!
Até logo, com muito muito amor!
~sister Wilkinson
Oh, so much to say, and these Brasilian keyboards are funky.
The plane ride was boring: no music, no movies, and I got approximately.00847363 hours of sleep. On the bright side, I did give a Livro de Mormon to the Brasilian guy sitting next to me. We had a great conversation actually, even in my broken Portuguese, about the gospel and stuff. I pointed out 3 Ne 11 and the introduction and Moroni 10:4-5 to him, and he asked if it was the word of God. I told him that yes, it is the word of God, and that he can pray to God to know like I did. He read through a bit of it and told me he felt like it made sense in his head and in his heart. It was just an all around good experience.
We landed in São Paulo and I sheperded 17 Elders through customs and then there was some confusion as to who was picking us up, and then a couple of us apperantly had our passports stamped wrong, but all was figured out and we were off!All I have to say is Eu amo o Brasil! (and yes, you need to spell it with an S) That means "I love brasil!" From the moment I stepped out of the airport, i fell in love. As we drove from the airport to the CTM, various elements of São paulo reminded me of other places i´ve been, like Amman and Mexico and a little bit of India (open sewer lines, anyone?), but cleaner, and smells better. And Brasil just has... it~s own rhythm, it´s own... sabor (flavor). I can´t quite describe. But I love it.
The CTM is much smaller than the Provo one (duh). It´s more like a family than a facility. It also has a super high tech security system invented by Israelis. Combine that with the Lord´s power and no one is going to hurt us! There are only 46 sisters here, and only half are American. It´s so much fun to sit with the brasileiros at mealtimes and practice speaking with them. They´re supposed to try and learn English on their missions, and it´s just way fun teaching them cool words and learning them. Some favorites:
brincaderia--just kidding
smagar--to smash
namorado--boyfriend (you hear that one a LOT around here, or namorada, which is girfriend)
My companion is Sis Campbell. We´re getting along pretty well =] Our roommates are two brasileiras. We´ve had a lot of fun adventures with communicating with them. One of the funniest is when Sis de Jesus was showing us a picture of her boyfriend and said (in portugues) "This is my boyfriend" and then something else we didnt catch, so she repeated it and pointed to her hand. we were like "is he married? has a ring? huh?" and finally I was like "He doesnt have a hand?" and we were like nooo, that can´t be it, that´s way too random... but that´s EXACTLY what she was trying to say! It took us 10 minutes to figure it out, hahaha. But how random is that? "this is my boyfriend and he only has one hand"... yeah. But they´re fun and I can tell already my portuguese is going to improve so much from it. My acting ability even moreso; I´m going to be a master Charades player when i get back!
We made friends with two brasilian elders that we sit with a lot at meal times; elders vargas and lima. Elder Lima knows quite a bit of english, Elder Vargas just nods and smiles and gives us the thumbs up. But with the portuguese I know and, again, lots of hand gestures, i can usually get the point across. They´re way fun and we´ve learned some fun words from them. They also enjoy getting me to try and pronounce "-ão" correctly, because apperantly I can´t get it to sound like QUITE like a native, though I´m ALMOST there. Bah. Oh well, that will come in time, não?
This week has mostly been spent in the class room. We live there. We only take breaks for meals and for an hour of gym. Our teachers are great. They´re all native brasilians, and they´re hilarious. Our teacher in the morning just teaches us funny things, but they´re only funny in portuguese... I would try to explain, but you have to hear it. So maybe in a year and a half. My Portuguese is improving rapidly. Even with my spanish background and knack for languages, I´m picking it up waaaay faster than I should. I can tell the Lord is blessing me. And I love learning all the doctrine. The gospel of JEsus Christ is so beautiful because it´s so deep but so simple. Go read Preach My Gospel chapter 3: Lessons.
This friday we´re going prostelying out on a street in São Paulo. Yes, they take us out for 4 hours and we have to talk to people and give out pass-along cards and everything. Crazy, não? I´ll let you know how that goes.Today we went to the Campinas temple--gorgeous! It was mostly in English. Way cool. It was nice to get out, though I got a little sick on the bus.
I wish I could send you pictures, but we´re not allowed to take our cameras outside the CTM. Safety issues. Smart, but inconvenient. I will eventually, I promise =] Write to me! Pray for me!
Até logo, com muito muito amor!
~sister Wilkinson
Monday, March 2, 2009
Well, the MTC has been quite an interesting experience. There were 30 Elders and 6 Sisters who were supposed to go to Brasil but had their visas delayed. I got my visa yesterday and head out on Tuesday! (along with 15 elders). The rest of the sisters and Elders actually just got theirs today, all except one poor Elder. But I'm sure it'll come through soon =] They all leave Wednesday.
The first few days here were brutal. Like I said, it was like drinking from a firehose. There was just SO much to adjust to, I didn't sleep well the first few days. But on Sunday, right when I reached the breaking point, I finally remembered, and the Spirit bore witness of, why I'm here. I'm here to spread the light of Christ. I'm here to teach people that the gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored, and that through the gospel and Christ's atonement we can return to our Father in Heaven.
In other news: I love Portuguese. What a beautiful language! I've picked it up surprisingly fast--even with my Spanish background and natural affinity for languages, it's way fast. I know it's the Lord blessing me. I'm so excited to go to Brasil and speak to the people there in their own language! The language just fits me, just like Brasil. My teachers here in the MTC have been awesome. I feel like I've never learned or grown so much than in this past week and a half. It's been wonderful.I love all the other sisters in my group; we all have similar personalities and get along so well--that's probably why we're all going to Brasil =] The Elders are great too! Some of them are just so on the ball--I'm way impressed. And some of them are hilarious. I wish I had time to write more! But we only have a half hour here to check our email on P-day.
I love you all!!!
Con muito amor,
Sis. Wilkinson
The first few days here were brutal. Like I said, it was like drinking from a firehose. There was just SO much to adjust to, I didn't sleep well the first few days. But on Sunday, right when I reached the breaking point, I finally remembered, and the Spirit bore witness of, why I'm here. I'm here to spread the light of Christ. I'm here to teach people that the gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored, and that through the gospel and Christ's atonement we can return to our Father in Heaven.
In other news: I love Portuguese. What a beautiful language! I've picked it up surprisingly fast--even with my Spanish background and natural affinity for languages, it's way fast. I know it's the Lord blessing me. I'm so excited to go to Brasil and speak to the people there in their own language! The language just fits me, just like Brasil. My teachers here in the MTC have been awesome. I feel like I've never learned or grown so much than in this past week and a half. It's been wonderful.I love all the other sisters in my group; we all have similar personalities and get along so well--that's probably why we're all going to Brasil =] The Elders are great too! Some of them are just so on the ball--I'm way impressed. And some of them are hilarious. I wish I had time to write more! But we only have a half hour here to check our email on P-day.
I love you all!!!
Con muito amor,
Sis. Wilkinson
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