18 April 2011 - email

SO! How is it in sunny Oregon? (adapt this sentence in your head if you're not there, thanks!)

Here it's raining like crazy! Some of the roads here actually turn into rivers! Today was a lot better so we went to the center and wandered around for a while.

This week we did a division with our LZ (Zone Leaders for those of you non-Brazilian missionaries) and my ZL is, guess...YEP! Elder Wells! [Elder Wells was David's 1st companion when he arrived in Recife from the MTC] We had a fairly typical day here (not much more than walking from one fallen appointment to the next) and we stopped to have a long discussion about the area. We prayed and we just started talking. We came up with this:

1. The leadership of the ward doesn't know how to work with missionaries (the area was closed for over a year!), so we need to guide them by the hand.

2. I let my fear of failure control me. I need to focus on the spirit and strive to follow his council and not MY ideas.

3. My comp lets his love of people control him. He needs to let investigators that don't want anything alone.

4. We need to organize and plan better and more rapidly.

To meet all of these we have created a notebook of the area and are filling it with information of all of the leadership and the area (map, contacts, etc). It's going to be awesome!

Funny aside: Here in Pernambuco when people would say "whoops" or "oh-no" in English, they say "Eita bixiga" which translates to (more or less) "Wuh-oh bladder". My comp and I were in an area really far from home and we both needed to use the bathroom so we tried to find a member, but they weren't at home. Another member lives close by so we started walking there and my comp started half-dancing. He said, "I can't stop dancing!" At the same time I stumbled and, without thinking, I said "Eita bixiga!" We both burst out laughing (which just made it worse) because it sounded like I was saying that I didn't need to dance, because - "Wuh-oh bladder!" Trust me, it was really funny.

Elder Page

11 April 2011 - email

HEY Y'ALL!

So I've got good news and awesome news!

Good News:
So I got a call saying that I was transferred. We went to the office and I my comp hadn't gotten there yet, so President interviewed me (my new zone already got interviewed). President told me that I had passed through a few tough companions and he wanted to give me a break.

Great News:
He told me that I would be a senior companion to Elder Sousa (he was in UR-7 when I was in Várzea) one of the coolest new missionaries that I know. He's super obedient, and loves the investigators. I'm in Jenipapo. It's been closed for about a year (with missionaries doing visits like I was in Vàrzea) so the memebers have a ton of referrals and the bishop is super-excited to have missionaries (in 5 days he's visited houses with us two nights and he has two jobs!). There are some amazing people here. A funny thing is that there is a large neighborhood named Côrrego de Jenipapo and several others with the name Côrrego which means literally "creek" but colloquially it means gutter, because many gutters resemble disgusting creeks filled with fecal matter.

My comp is awesome.

Write me letters.

Keep the faith.

Another sentence.

That wasn't a sentence, but a phrase.

I love you all!

Elder Page

21 March 2011 - email

I am still in São Lourenço! I'm still with Elder Lima! We didn't get transferred and new missionaries didn't get transferred here.

I really thought that we'd get more missionaries here (the area is really going great!) Right now we're helping two couples get married and several youths to be baptized.

I found out more about Josanilda this week! She told us that when she was still in spiritualism she went to visit her sister in São Paulo for the first time and the night before she dreamed that she was in the São Paulo airport and no one was there to take her to her sister's house. She began to get nervous and worried about where she should go, or what she should do. Suddenly two  tall men dressed completely in white walked up to her and one asked if she would like to go to her sister's house. She said, "Yes, but I don't know the way." The man told her not to worry, that they would guide her. When she got to her sister's house she woke up. And she said that when she got to São Paulo (she had never seen anything there before) her sister was there and as they walked to her sister's house, she recognized all of the streets. She felt a peace that told her that God would take care of her. Then her sister invited her to visit the church on Sunday. She went and the lesson was about eternal families. This was something that no other church teaches and that she had secretly desired for years and years. From this moment she began to separate from spiritualism, but it took her a year to visit the church again. She decided that she would go to church again and she had a dream again. This time her aunt who was very sick died and she had to tell her aunt that it was her time, but that she (Josanilda) had work to do in this life. She felt strongly that she had to go visit the church of her sister again. She went there and met us (two men dressed in white shirts that reminded her of the dream in São Paulo) and she heard again the same lesson about eternal families that she had heard last year. She decided instantly that she would be baptized, she just waited until she felt that she was prepared. I am so happy to have been a part of that process. Now her daughter and her daughter's boyfriend are getting ready!

You know how everyone at home says that cold weather causes colds? Well here it's HOT weather! I don't know what to do with all of the superstitions I've heard by now. I guess I should just hole up in my house and curl up into the fetal position. All this time I just thought sickness was caused by bacteria!

Elder Page.

14 March 2011 - email

I found myself getting a new comp on Monday: Elder Lima! He knows the area and he's a hard worker. I think that this is going to be a good time here!

Josanilda got baptized! It was amazing! She was calm, and when I lowered her into the water she was so serene. She also got up in front with no prompting and bore her testimony while crying and looking directly into my eyes the whole time. We had to call president about her baptism and he told us that she was exactly his 7000th baptism! He was excited because we've been writing to him about her and calling him about her. Her daughter is exactly where her mom was a week and a half ago; she wants to be baptized, but "something's missing" (IE: deciding to be baptized). They are a family that I'll never forget. Her husband came too! And we're going to try to work with her daughter's boyfriend now. They are all such wonderful people that it's hard to not hug Josanilda!

I think that president is going to split the area here in two and send two more missionaries (Lima as senior of one duo, and me of the other) by the way he was talking in the interview. I am really happy now and I really can't wait to meet more people like Josanilda. Help the missionaries. And if you're not a member and you're reading this, give a moment's thought to listening to their message. Think of a skinny, brown David Page working in the hot Brazilian sun if that helps you. [David said that he gained some weight in the MTC, but has lost ~50 lbs since!]

Stay strong,
Elder Page

28 February 2011 - email

Hey there!

I hate carnival.

Just thought I'd get that out. It hasn't even started yet and I've already seen evidence of every one of the ten commandments being broken in public in the same place. What's even more ridiculous is that it's considered preparation for holy week. It's like a set of mathematical equations:

• Holy Week = No sin for a week.
• Carnival = Sin of a week and a half piled into half of a week.
• Carnival + Holy Week = Week and a half of time = Week and a half of sin

Carnival is from two words meaning "Festival of the flesh"! And to make things worse, the city center is close to our house!

Other than that, a lot of good is happening here:

We baptized three cousins on Saturday. Mateus (10), Laiane (11), and Laiz (12) are excited to go to church, but a little shy. The youth here have an encampment that they do here during Carnival so the girls were invited (Mateus is too young). It's kind of like EFY, but planned to cover the time of Carnival. There's no such thing as Boy Scouts here and it's easy to see that the lack of that program has taken it's toll; almost no young men are preparing for missions. I am becoming more and more appreciative of the Boy Scouts. The Boy Scouting program prepares young men for the mission and later life.

Elder Pajé (yeah I found out that the real word is with 'j' and not 'g', but almost no one knows that!)

21 February 2011 - email

I'm serving in São Laurenço da Mata. It's huge! And it is amost ready to split into two wards. All we have to do is fully activate the "I go to church 1 Sunday of 3" people!

I've been reading the Old Testament with a lot of help from the bible dictionary and the intensity of the symbolism in the sacrifices in Leviticus is amazing! Last time I read this book, I wasn't paying attention and I didn't quite understand that different parts of the animals were used in different parts of the sacrifice. The blood, as a symbol of life's power, was spilt, sprinkled, or placed (pay attention to when each action is done). The fat a symbol of richness was offered to the lord along with the kidneys and the caul above the liver (what is a caul? please e-mail me if you know!). The shoulder or breast (the best meat) was sometimes burned, sometimes eaten by the high priest (D&C 1:38 anyone? It is "by the mouth of [his] servants"!) I still get confused by some parts of Genesis, so if anyone has insights, help me: Angels having babies with women? Giants? Noah got drunk? The whole 'trick' with the birthright of Jacob? And did Joseph really not harbor anything (his brothers traveled like 4 times from Canaan to Egypt and back!).

In the Book of Mormon, I've been studying the attributes of Captain Moroni (for my Armor of God book!). Really cool! Take each thing that is said about him and use the Topical Guide and Index to find more!

Elder Page

8 February 2011 - email

Hey Family! Oh, and friends who are reading this. And people who I don't really know that well but know my family members and for some reason feel thus obligated to read the scrambled ramblings of a scattered 19-year-old teaching Brazilians the truth. Hmmm...I think that's everyone.

 

So there's some weird Brazilian traditions and superstitions that I don't think I've written about, and since it's been really slow this week, I'll catch up some lost time.

 

WATER:

 

So here it's a superstition that cold water makes you sick. Drink it. Bathe in it. Touch it. Look at it. Any of these things can cause you to get the flu or "pass bad" (Brazilian for really bad diarrhea. Sorry, I decided to be frank). I'm not sure how many times I've drunk warm water here, but I've realized that its worse than hot water. No wonder God spews lukewarm people from out of his mouth!

 

On the other hand I had a comp (Trindade) who told me that drinking warm water or hot water was bad for your intestines. Hmmm, so all of the studies saying that it helps are wrong. And can you explain why you drink chimarrão (a very bitter, very hot tea)...

 

BODY AND FOOD:

 

"I was really active and did a lot of sports when I was younger and that cleans out your pores, so I think that's why I don't have body hair!" ... ... WAIT! Hair comes from clogged pores! Does that mean that zits are genetic?

 

The 'gum stays in your stomach for 20 years and gives you cancer' thing is also pretty big here. Makes no sense, but sure. You'd die of clogged colon long before dying of cancer, but sure, it's true.

 

So almost everyone here loves farofa. They like to put it in their beans and rice, on their meat, salad, etc. What exactly is farofa? FLOUR. DEEP. FRIED. FLOUR! Sometimes it's mixed with vegetables and little bits of meat so I can see it being used. But sometimes they just put flour. Just flour!

 

 

Well, that's all for now!

 

Elder Page