October 29

It´s for sure summer. It´s hot again. I guess I forgot how hot it gets here. Everyone says that the city São Paulo itself is a little colder  than being out in the more rural cities, so I was convinced that it wouldn´t ever feel as hot as it did out in Sorocaba, but it´s just about as hot as it was out there. At least we get rain out here. About every 3 days the sky falls at about 4 - 5 pm for about 30 minutes (wait, the sky falls... did anyone see Operation Skyfall?) cooling off the the city for the day, so it´s a little better here in the city.

Anyway, this week has been alright. We had some really solid investigators that were coming to church, and getting prepared to be baptized, but stopped when we started telling them that they have to get married. They had already received all of the lessons and everything, but the mom just was not interested at all in getting married. As we came out of church yesterday, we spotted the family crossing the street in front of the chapel. The mom looked like she was in a hurry to get across the street before anyone from the church could spot them. Too late. I gave them a nice friendly wave. They all saw it, but no one acknowledged that I was waving to them. Anyway, that was a bummer, but on Friday, we got a call from some guy that he wants to be baptized. He just got out of jail it sounds like, and he has had problems with drugs and alcohol, and now he says he wants to get his life turned around. Well, we just so happen to have the best information on how to do that. We marked a date for this Saturday, and we´re going to see what we can do.

It´s Halloween time and no one has even shown the slightest interest. Elder Ruiz Diaz and I thought about calling President Martins on his p-day to ask him what he was going to be for halloween, but we decided not to. It was his p-day and was probably busy studying. Oh, and he probably wouldn´t have found it very funny.

We had a big mission conference this last Tuesday. Usually our conferences are divided into 3 days, 1/3 each day. This time it was a special conference, so we had all of the missionaries from city, which was about 2/3, so I got to see a lot of my old companions and friends like Elder Davis, Elder Paxman, and Elder Larsen.  I talked with Elder Davis about college, and he´s applying to UVU too. All of my buddies are zone leaders. For me, I figure if I continue with my normal pattern, I´ll probably stay here and get a new companion and train again this next transfer. That´s my best guess as to what´s probably going to happen.

Is Dallin studying Preach My Gospel much? Is he finding much time to study? I had a decent grip on PMG and the scriptures before I left, but something I would like to have done more before leaving is study. Particularly chapter 3 of PMG and the scriptures that accompany the lessons in that chapter. Next week I´m going to send a few of the most common doubts that people have as we teach for him to answer with scriptures he´s found.

Lars´ costume worked out pretty well. I can remember Dallin always wanting to have the most difficult costumes ever, and almost always never ended up as what he originally wanted.

I´m excited that Jordan´s getting back out into the field. Now that he´s been home for so long, I´ve kind of caught up to him with how much time we both have on the mission. 

I´m at almost 1 year and 5 months now. It´s going to be over so fast. Every week gets away from me faster than the previous. Some days I´d love nothing more than to come home and just sit around, but there are quite a few days that I don´t even want anyone to talk about anything related to me going home. Everyone misses their mission, but I´m also going to miss Brasil. I absolutely hate how hot it is, but I think if I wasn´t walking in the sun all day with these clothes, it could be bearable. I really hope can find some job that brings me back here often. Lots of members tell me I´m going to marry a Brasileira, but I´m not so sure. I don´t like the idea of having to deal with two sides of the family that are two different countries and speak different languages. But who knows. We´ll just have to wait and see what happens after I´m back.

Anyway, that´s it for today. I´m going to try and work on those essays really quick. Até a próxima semana. Um abraço.

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-Elder Candland