11-30-2009 Letter Home

"HELLLLLOOOOOOO VIEEEEEETNNNAAAAAAMMMMM!!!!"

Serto. Not that huge of a week. Maybe I will get some more time to send photos and talk about my companion. Last P-Day was the funnest P-Day we have had yet. All the Elders in our Zone fourteen in all came to Juazeiro to have a barbecue at our casapela!

"our casapela" - church?

Me with a bunch of cattle (vashos, spelling maybe wrong) after lunch on Sunday in Malvinas, a long way away from Juazeiro, because we were celebrating there the new branch that just opened in Barbalha. Look these places up on Google Earth!

It was way fun. We watched "Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration" on our big projector screen there, then afterward a movie with Jon Heder called "School for Scoundrels". It was very funny and the first movie I've watched completely on the mission. It wasn't authorized by mission standards, it turns out, but the blame goes to the guy who picked it out. We all thought it was a Disney movie. It wasn't terrible though. Very fun day.

So, our Otimo Familia is actually the Santos Family and we worked with them A LOT this last week. Pretty much every day we would go to see them. The parents, the aunt, the older daughter and the older cousin are going to take a little more time to convert, but the teenagers, five out of six of them, were doing so well that we couldn't deny them baptism this last Sunday. They were reading the Book of Mormon, praying every day, and they said they were feeling the Spirit so much together. So they entered the waters of baptism! I baptized three of them, Jorge, Jackson, and Jardel. I have big hopes for them. But, we are also hoping that the adults will join too, because it will be so much harder for the kids without them.

The Santos Brothers, five out of six of them! The three standing directly to my right and looking over each other´s heads were the ones I baptized.

Elder Pereira and Elder Ojopi trying to look cool, walking in slow-motion

We are preparing another family for baptism, Otocilo and his wife, who is pregnant. They have a two year old son named Saul who runs around and falls down a lot and likes me a lot. Every time I come to the house he runs over to sit by me. Haha. Very cute. Otocilo works for the city, not quite sure what exactly but he has a pretty nice house in a pretty nice neighborhood, Novo Juazeiro (in Juazeiro, still, though). They are pretty much members already, very nice and friendly people. Otocilo likes us so much one day he just tagged along with us for hours as we were looking for a new house for some extra missionaries president is sending here next transfer. The problem is they are not married yet, and that takes a while in Brazil. We will find out today if the paperwork went through fast enough.

We had Zone Conference this last Saturday! It was excellent. Had some good talks by President Batt, who is an awesome leader, and I got to bear my testimony. I had a very helpful interview with President Batt and after all the formal stuff, we went to a pizzaria where we ate as much exotic Brazilian pizza as we could hold in our stomachs!

                                                     "Pizza!"

Lately, because we don't eat dinner here, I have learned to cram in a ton of food every lunchtime, and this ability I am developing came in handy that night. You learn to stop as soon as you feel sharp pains in your intestinal area. Gostozo (delicious)!

This week we went into the Bazaar they have here one morning to find bananas. There is just a huge concrete building in Juazeiro, like a parking garage, only it has been transformed by whoever wants to buy a stall or space into this huge marketplace where they sell everything from fruit smoothies, to shoes and cellphones. Really cool place. Its dark and noisy in there and it feels really exotic to descend into the belly of raw, foreign capitalism. No pictures of the place, though... my camera would probably get stolen there.

So, about Elder Carvalho, my trainador. He is one of the best missionaries here and a very interesting guy. He has become a good friend and I hope throughout the mission and after we will stay good friends. He is the son of a General Seventy. Anyway, he belongs to a very notable family in Sao Paulo. Lots of rich and famous uncles.
Elder Carvalho  is an interesting guy. You would like him Dad. He has a lot of big ambitions in business and is very determined and hardworking. When he was 18 he was able to get a job in sales in the World Trade Center in Brazil. He rose to the top as a salesman and by the time he left for his mission he was leading a large team of salesmen and was recognized as a kind of wunderkind of the company. He has sold a company that he ran on the side that managed apartments in the interior of Sao Paulo for quite a bit of money  and has some big plans when he returns for different products. He lived in the United States for a year studying at BYU and while there he learned English and he speaks it fluently. He has studied in tons of universities around the world, actually, in Argentina, Britain... a world traveler kind of guy. He has some great stories!
One day, the President of the World Trade Center in Brazil called him up and said his English translator had gotten in a car crash and that he was flying to the United States to meet some of the presidential candidates (this is in February or March) in order to establish relations. So my companion got to go to this big dinner in Chicago to translate for the President of the WTC and what do you know, he got to meet and talk to Barack Obama, and shake his hand. This was back when he was a long-shot hopeful. Cool, huh?
I wish I could tell you more about him. He has been a great trainer and if I could teach as well as he can, I will be very proud of my mission. He has a very fun personality which has made my first transfer much easier.

Hey, Connor, have you met an Elder Monteiro there? The LZ of my zone, has a twin in Porto Alegre Norte, just like Elder Cheever and us. He is leaving in a week, though, so you might not get to meet him. Did I mention I met Elder Cheever on my first night in Fortaleza? He has been training Elder Clay this whole time. Cool that we were finally able to meet.

So, I did get the cards, Mom, no worries there. Thanks so much! Some stuff that would be nice to get later on: hot chocolate, something small to remove stains, and if you do ever send me clothing send me more of those black Dickies pants, they definitely work better, and I wish we hadn't listened to that lady and bought those other kinds.

Connor: Sailing trip during Sophomore year! Seals swimming by our boat and the lush green mountains on either side of us! I loved that trip so much, it was so fun.

Awesome, family, about duning and Thanksgiving and movies. Feel free to tell me as much as you can or want to about fun stuff that happened. It doesn't make me feel homesick, it actually helps me feel the opposite, because I know what is happening on the other side. I will have to answer your questions next time, maybe ask them again. The language is coming along well, I can have simple conversations now but I am still having difficulties. Everyone says I am learning quickly though. I will probably get the package a few weeks after it arrives, it just has to wait there until someone travels from the Mission Office to our area and can carry it. That visa problem sounds really horrible, it started soon after we arrived in the CTM, so I feel really blessed we were able to sneak in. Thanksgiving sounded really fun. Transfers are next week, cant wait to figure out whether I'll stay or not.

                                            "what I had for Thanksgiving Dinner, hah"

Love you all! Hey Connor, awesome letter, wish I could say more about it.

Elder Ojopi and me! Elder Ojopi is from Rodonia in Porto Velho and has been a great friend here, very nice guy.

11- 23-2009 Letter Home

Hello Friends and Family

This week was the toughest week I have had on the mission! Wow! Glad it is over. I am happy to report that I am over it and ready to finish out the last two weeks of this transfer strong. What kind of difficulties? Just new-American-missionary-feeling-frustrated-with-the-language and companions and the heat kind of difficulties. nothing big.

You will have to excuse the poor quality of this message. this keyboard wont let me delete anything without risking deleting entire sentences. it is very frustrating. Man, this message might be pretty short because it is so difficult to write. i never get what i want with e-mails...

So last week President Batt let us play Rockband for P-Day! It was very divertido!

"Last Monday President Batt gave us permission to play Rockband at the Lojas Americanas mall for P-Day! It was fun!"

hope you like the photo! We played for hours, all in English, and my favorite song to sing was "will you be my girl", hah! After that day we were singing rock and roll songs around the house for the rest of the week!

Streets of Juazeiro from bus window

The best news of this week was our Awesome Family, I think I mentioned them last e-mail. Both Elder Carvalho and I do not remember their surname. fourteen people. We found them on November 11 and gave them a short message.

We invited them to Church and what do you know, defying all convention, when we arrived Sunday morning they were all showered and ready to go! Yeah, I did write about this earlier.

ANYWAY, we returned to their home and we gave a great message about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which they really liked. It is awesome to just be surrounded by this giant family in their Living Room and teach them all at once. They really like us and say they feel a good spirit when we are in their homes. They have two twin three year olds, Andre and Andrea, who are very rambunctious (sp?) and cute. Anyway, we asked them if they had received an answer after praying and what do you know, almost half of the children did! They raised their hands, said they had prayed and felt the feelings in their heart which we told them is the Holy Ghost. One of the teenagers said that he felt as if a big fan started blowing in his heart! They have been excellent and if they join the church, it will bless their lives so much. Their grandmother has tuberculosis and Elder Carvalho felt inspired to tell them that if they we baptized and began living the commandments, their grandmother would be cured. Very powerful.

They were so excited yesterday when we drove up in this bus the Church bought for our area.We didn't actually drive it, but the driver stopped in front of their house and all the kids came running out. They thought it was so fun, that a bus came to pick them all up for free. They stayed all three hours in church, and I felt that they liked it. Andre and Andrea felt a little cooped up and were being a little crazy at the end, but I am sure they had a very spiritual experience. Tonight we are going to bring some member families to their house for family home evening and I think they will like that a lot as well.

Speaking about family home evenings, I have to tell you about our Elite Special Family Forces! There are three families in our branch that are super strong, they have been in the church for a while and the parents hold the important callings. We basically call on these families to help with missionary work once, sometimes multiple times in the week. They are very devoted, especially when you consider it costs them a lot to take bus rides across the town, but they are also very blessed by their informal calling to help fellowship all of our investigators. When investigators show up in Church, they are there introducing themselves, inviting them to their houses... just the nicest people with very powerful testimonies. If we didn't have them it would be so much more difficult to do missionary work here. Last night we had a Family Home Evening with the same people we will have FHE tonight with, and our investigator family just enjoyed the company so much. They went from having some doubts about getting baptized to being extremely enthusiastic about that.

     I hope no one thinks that I am saying our American LDS families should be better like these people here, you cant really compare... but it is very cool, because in Juazeiro we live on the frontier of the Kingdom of God, and these awesome, powerful families that have nothing of the comforts that we Americans have, with our large membership and concentration in the States,  are here, helping the work along in a big way and being super blessed and happy while doing it! I love being with them, they have become very good friends and I will miss them.

Other things... I had to fast this week. Hardest. Fast. Of. My Life. walking in the equatorial sun without being able to drink water at every house is tough. In Brazil, we eat lunch, the biggest meal, at noon, then skip dinner and breakfast the next day, culminating the fast with eating lunch the following day.

So that night it rained at about 4 in the morning and I just stumbled out of my room out into our hallway, which doesn't have a roof, and let the rain pour over my face. man. Tough. But that was also the day that our Awesome Family reported that many of the children and teenagers received responses to their prayers.

                                                                      "Photo of my hallway"

Well, I need to type responses to family:

First, to my brother Connor. Sorry that you had a tough week yo! I've been hurting too, though homesickness was only part of the equation. I still have the vision [for the work], but I have been burying it lately as it is hard to transform it into action when I do not know Portuguese. I think I need to take it easy and learn the basics out here before I really launch into my "epic missionary phase". Learn how to teach powerful lessons, get along with companions, and speak Portuguese. Once I have those down, I can start doing missionary work the way I feel it needs to be done. That experience with that guy with the broken legs must have been very cool, my friend! Don't feel like you aren't being as good as you can, you definitely are!

Memory: The Tuckfields, at their house, playing "Mario Party" and making a whirlpool in their swimming pool out back. Remember that? That was so fun. I miss those guys! I love you man! Keep strong! I know you can do everything you set your mind to!

shoot, I gotta go right now. I read all the letters and I hope you all have fun in Glamis! (Ah man...) And in Arizona with family! I miss that so much.  I love you Lynsey and Kaitlin, I am glad to know you are both doing great. I love you Mom!

I am going to write until the second I have to send this message.

Mom, I am the cleanest, most organized missionary here, thanks to you! Actually, I have found washing dishes and mopping the floor, putting food away is a good stress-reliever and helps me feel like I am contributing to the household! I hope I keep this habit!  I have had dreams of hugging or being with you guys as well. I like those. There was one time I drifted to sleep during study time that I hugged Kaitlin almost just as if she was really there, it was so real.

Hope the photos got through okay! A few more sights of Juazeiro. Oh, by the way, I saw the blogs! They looked great! Good job Mom, really good work.

I love you all! Have a fantastic Thanksgiving Week! Three more days and I'll have been out here for three months. Very cool! Shout out to relatives and friends! I know I don't pay enough attention to all of ya!

Sweet. Amo voces!

- Elder Brendon Carpenter

i was like a spy right there... with a camera snapping pictures straight from my pocket. *cue cool music* by the way, I've seen scenes from a lot of movies here. People love American movies, and everyone just watches TV during lunch, they don't like to talk. Made me feel awkward at first, but the other Elders say that you can't help watching TV sometimes, and you shouldn't feel bad about it.

Ive seen parts of Wolverine, Click, Mission Impossible 3, the Nutty Professor, and Twilight (Crepusculo, here, and the members love the movie because the book was written by a member, hah), and others but I cant quite remember. These little tastes of cinema will help me get through the mission, I hope!

I was going through the blog and I noticed Mom typed up those fantastic entries about our last day, saying goodbye and everything. great job Mom! Very proud of ya.

yes, Lynsey, they do not have Thanksgiving here. But what day is Thanksgiving? I cannot remember. You are my best friend as well! i love ya Lyns!

Elder Pereira and I at the bus station in Fortaleza at night, heading to Juazeiro.

11-17-2009 Letter Home

My email is down!
Spent fifteen minutes trying to send video through GMail and its not working, either. Nossa, nossa, nossa. Well, handbook says I need to e-mail my family every week, so I guess I am using Gmail today, maybe the only time ever. (!) No messages from anybody today, either. That sucks.

I am going to try to send pictures real quick. I hope it works.

So... G-mail works worse than regular email for some reason. I am starting to hate internet cafes... can't get photos or video through every single time. Anyway, so while I was on Gmail I saw some mail from Facebook. Hmmm... is that okay? I don't know. But, it says that Ive gotten a lot of friend requests and messages. Mom, Lynsey, whoever, do you think you could accept those friend requests and possibly reply to some comments that I am serving a mission in Brazil, and will gladly take addresses so that I can mail friends? That'd be fantastic, thanks in advance!

                 Elder Carvalho, Talysson, and Elder Brendon

I hope you get the picture, but we had another baptism this week: Talysson, sixteen years old, really into Brazilian jujitsu. We had a tough time with him because he went to another church where the pastor and others regularly got up on the pulpit and slammed the Mormons. At one point he said he didn't want to see us any more. But we kept on testifying and persevering and finally he said he realized that God wanted him to join our church. Fantastic! I hope you get the picture.

Moto-taxis. Here in Juazeiro, you can hop on a motorcycle with the driver and get anywhere in the city
for three to five reals. Really cheap and fast. Really fun to ride them because you skip the long walks across cobblestone roads. Especially fun at night. Just yesterday I was riding through this one hilly part of Juazeiro at night and it was beautiful, with all the orange lights dotting the hillsides. Really cool. Also, outside of Juazeiro is very green! We were able to see the outskirts a lot for some reason this last week and its gorgeously green. Well, there are some fields that are completely dirt-covered with trash mixed in... but there are some areas that are very beautiful. The greens here are brighter, for some reason, makes it feel very tropical. There are hills that surround Juazeiro that are very beautiful... not like big rolling California hills, much more sculpted and rugged like Arizona, but covered with green brush. I want to show photos!

Man, people are nice here. Every time we stop to give a lesson its: "voce quer agua?"  "Ou comida (food)?" "Pastels? Bolu (cake)?" Lots of hospitality here. Not like the States at all.

Restaurants and kitchonettes (cafes) cook their meat outside in the streets, here. So while Elder Carvalho and I are walking to an appointment, every day we pass these big open grills with simmering sausage and chicken. Smells so good. The streets smell like shower-and-sink-water from the gutters mixed with freshly-cooked steak and sausage. Not a pleasant mix but its better than if there was no meat-smell at all.

 

                        Mangoes!


Sausages are big here. They must have gotten it from the Germans. Really good stuff. Rice, beans, mashed potatoes, this stuff like cuscus (sp?) and always fruit... though the way fruit hangs off every other tree (coconuts, mangos especially), I am surprised they dont use it more.

So, Connor, how about that one summer we went to four or five different water parks? Wasn't as fun as going to that one waterpark in Utah, but definitely a fun summer all around. Fortaleza is known for its huge waterparks, which I haven't seen, but I've seen advertisements. Looks so refreshing when I am walking under the sun to an appointment.

Last P-Day we went to the Lojas Americanas: American Shops. It's this big mall in the center of Juazeiro (that would probably be the best place to hole up in for a zombie outbreak). Anyway, it is just like a normal mall from the US and it made me feel quite at home. Ate ice cream, pizza, watched someone play Rockband on this huge bigscreen TV (a pay-to-play thing there), and hung out at the food court. It was very fun.

Every P-Day we play this Brazilian version of RISK, which is cool. Get some extra sleep... its very necessary for the rest of the week because by Sunday night we are dead tired.

We found this one family this week who lives in this big orchard in the middle of Juazeiro in this little house. Fourteen people in this family, mostly kids, all boys except the youngest. And they were fantastic! At the end of our message about the Restoration of the Gospel, we asked them if they wanted to go to Church, and the matriarch of the family, an older women, pauses for a moment, looks around, and says: "Sim, vamos para sua igreja". Yes, we will go to your church. She proceeded to explain that they didn't have enough religion in their lives and they wanted to see what it was like. Excellent, right? That Sunday Elder Carvalho and I walked ahead a group of eight for twenty minutes to the casapela, me singing "The Spirit of God" in English to entertain the kids. Because of that family, this week we were able to get twelve of our investigators to church, which is really, really good. The big family left before I was able to talk to them about the experience, but I think it went well.

Well, I love you guys. Sorry I wasnt able to get your messages! Not my fault! Keep up the good fight! The Gospel is true!

Your son, brother, friend, relative,
Elder Brendon Carpenter

Connor: Sweet e-mail. Pretty much the same on the language right now, Connor. I can understand most words but the context and everything... its weird, you cant understand the whole meaning of the conversation, you know? Elder Carvalho speaks English a lot to me too. We have to work on that. Cool adventure story, and Passo Fundo really sounds otimo.

Fortaleza accent is fun. Goshto instead of Gosto, por examplo. Very nasally compared to Sao Paulo, and very fast most of the times. People dont like to open their mouths here and really anunciate their words. Di and De is pronounced both ways, no set rule, which makes it difficult some times. It will be fun to compare after the mission.

Love you man,
Your brother

Dad: Thank you so much for the fantastic message, Dad. I've gotten used to much of my life here, it doesn't seem too weird anymore. I think our travels and open-mindset definitely helped here. Even in the CTM it has helped, as I've compared myself with other Elders who feel weirded out by little differences. The Church here is different, but the same. We don't have a chapel, and most people have joined the church if not in the last year, in the last handful of years. Our stake president and bishop are all converts of the last five years. Frontier of the Church, here in Juazeiro. Other than leaders and those involved in sacrament duties, members don't wear church clothes, which makes it feel much more like a Non-Denominational kind of church meeting, but we are definitely teaching the right doctrines. Those members that have leadership callings are very powerful, and some people make a lot of sacrifices to get to our small house-church. Very tight-knit group here, we feel like pioneers, I think, making do with what we have, but being stronger for it. The older members are exactly like members back in the US, though they might have less materially, they act just the same. But we have so many converts, it really feels more like a cross-section of average society, but that is better in some ways. I really love our branch here, I've made some great friends and they like me a lot even if I can't speak too much Portuguese.

Oh yeah, because its so hot, most of the women and girls do not like covering up, even in Church on Sundays... they wear nice clothes, but they would feel awkward in a chapel in the US, I think. Ah well, its not as horribly tempting as it sounds.

With some of our investigators, the problem that the LDS Church is too "American", with American origins, an American prophet and mostly American apostles does come up. We remind people that the Church had to be established somewhere, and then we mention that in Christ's Church during his ministry and afterward, all but one apostle was Jewish. It isn't as big of a problem as I thought it would be, and the members don't care about it at all. The members bring up the Kirtland Temple and the Pioneer Migration and other very American experiences for the Church very openly, and no one thinks different of it. There are times when Brazil is mentioned in a lesson in order to not alienate people too much, but there are some interesting experiences here for the Church as well. For example, one Apostle said that in the Last-Days, Brazil would be the safest place to live for the Saints, and another prophecy was made that Brazil would soon have the third most powerful economy, and other stuff specific for the Brazilian members. There is enough history here that the Church can be made to seem very Brazilian even when to the outward observer it is primarily an American church, with primarily American missionaries around the world.

You are the Elders Quorum President? Nossa, isto e loco! I don't even know where to begin! Man, that is so awesome. I'm sure it must seem like a huge responsibility right now but I think you are going to take to it very easily in time. Awesome that we can serve together. Wow, big responsibility. I know you will do great, though, Dad. The Lord has been preparing you.

Thank you so much for the motivating words and I will definitely read Alma 42 as soon as I get home. I love you Dad, I am thinking and praying for you every day as well. I am so grateful that you are my father. More and more every day here, too.

- Your son


Hope you are thinking of our RV and ATV trips a lot! I am!

Lynsey:  School is getting difficult, huh? It sounds fun to me! Hah. You are so awesome, Lynsey. Office is good, huh? And you saw 2012? Awesome. Want to see that movie so bad. Its showing in the theatres near here, too. So cool. I want the soundtrack to that! Dad is the new Quorum President? Wow! That is really crazy! Boa sorte, meu Pai! Muitos benoes para voe.

A Package? Right on! Cant wait to see what it is!

Love you so much! Thanks for the awesome message!
Your brother :)

11-09-2009 Letter Home

E hoje temos....

Another P-Day, another opportunity to speak with the outside world. So exciting!

Had a great week. First of all, thank you so much to Sister Reynolds for that awesome Halloween
card and message. One of the few I received. That was very nice.

Next, to Zack: my mission has been great so far, the only difficult part is being away from home, really. The MTC was very fun and you should enjoy every day of it, even though everyone complains that the field is going to be better, you start missing it when you leave. I´m not an awesome missionary
just yet, first I have to master the language and that is going to take some time. Right now I kind of feel like a dope because I can say very little to our investigators while my companion Elder Carvalho does all the talking. I just smile, go over a few points that I'm good at explaining, then testify, pray. People still feel the Spirit but I can't wait until I'm fluent. It takes a lot of work, learning another language, but I'm trying my best, so it shouldn't be too long.

The scriptures have given me a huge comfort. Reading and studying them daily is awesome and I hope I can keep the habit up throughout my mission and after. Elder Carvalho is a story and a half, I might tell more about him later in this installment. We definitely get along, he's a really cool guy and I can learn a lot from him. Anyway, thanks for the great letter man and for that scripture, Joshua 24:15, I really liked that! I miss you dude, and I love you!

Hey Uncle Todd, that was a great story about your first days in Peru. I feel grateful it wasn't that crazy. You know, really Brasil is a first-world country and it has a lot of things that I am still taking for granted. I am sure many missionaries are not so lucky. I would think you felt so isolated in Peru, it just sounds like there is so much more of a contrast between the country and the United States, but here, you know, I have the internet, and we have paved roads and restaurants and so forth... Not that bad, you know?

Hey Nick, thanks for the great letter, man! Yeah, time has really flown by, and more is bound to. Here in Juazeiro each missionary gets 350 reals which is like 500 dollars for a month. Lots of money, right? Well, things are actually more expensive here, strangely, and when you account for food, bus rides, water, electricity, it really adds up. ODST sounds so cool man! Argh, I want to play it! I want to send my iPod home for Christmas to get songs added to it, and that soundtrack is definitely one I would like, it sounds cool. Do the ODSTs have recharging shields? How does that work exactly? Is multiplayer very fun? Awesome, dude.

Connor, sounds like you are having a great time in Porto Alegre. How hot is it there? Man, it's hot here... in the 90's every day, but I am getting used to constantly sweating. The Spirit, the power of the Holy Ghost, is the most important power in missionary work and if you feel someone is ready, they should be baptized.  Always trust your mission president, they hold the keys, I think increased contacting and increased focus on fortifying members and investigators in gospel habits is something important. We´ve got to remember that.

Kaitlin, your costume was so beautiful! That must have been so fun! Thanksgiving is going to be fun, too! I love you so much, and I am glad you got to go to the library! Hope you are enjoying school and church and everything. I love love love you my sweet sister! You are so awesome. :)

Grandma and Granddad, thanks so much for your awesome message. I look forward to those. Yes, focusing on the Spirit and being obedient is a constant battle, but it is very important. I want so badly to be just a perfect missionary, a true disciple of Christ. I think I still need to build my confidence up but I feel I'm on my way. Thank you for your motivating words!

Mom, some quick answers to your quick answers: Yes, send all mail and packages to that address I sent you, the Fortaleza Mission Home, and make it easily accessible for everyone, if you could! By the way, I received the package, the whole thing a few days ago!!! So awesome! Everything worked out in the end. Thanks for all that great stuff, the candy, the reference book, the sewing kit, beef jerky, those awesome glow in the dark glasses (lol), it was a very fun day to open that. Awesome present. Yeah, I got the Halloween pictures. Hah, those were so funny. Awesome. Dad with that wig on...

I've been thinking of sending my iPod home so that you guys could put a bunch of stuff on it for Christmas, if I send it in the next few weeks you could get it back to me by Christmas with lots of MoTab, some soundtracks and other songs I would like. I really don't need anything, and other than music I would just like some treats from home. Nothing very important, ya know?

Geeze, Mom, awesome letter. Love that stuff about prayers and its great to hear news of how the family is doing. I'm glad things are going well there. Very awesome, touching letter, keep them coming, though I won't be able to reply specifically to all of the great stuff you said. All the stuff you are doing sounds so fun and great and you are such a cool Mom. I love you so much.

Lynsey, I love you so much and thank you for the great letter.

Alright, did I say anything about the ants here? They are HUGE! Scary little things. I've seen them cutting out huge chunks of fallen leaves, big rubbery things, with these mandibles that could clip your toenails. They are the kind that carry leaves in those lines down into their gigantic anthills. Crazy little things.

Quite a contrast between inside and outside, here. People have nice computers, plasma screen TVs, iPods, cell phones, all very American, but houses and cars are extremely expensive here, so people have small, small houses, sometimes just one room, and very few people have cars. It's a weird contrast sometimes to enter a house surrounded by a bunch of scruffy half-naked guys, with chickens running everywhere, but inside people are watching X-Men on a big plasma screen TV or playing video games. Weird, huh?

Alright, so some fun stuff happened this week. First of all, Elder Carvalho and I and the two other Elders that live with us were invited to teach a short English lesson to all the classes in this private school near here. And they agreed we could teach a little bit of the Gospel. So we go in and climb all these stairs to these classrooms where a bunch of uniformed fourteen and fifteen year olds are sitting in desks and we speak to them in English, introduce ourselves, say simple sentences. I passed around my photo of all of you guys, my family, and used it to teach words like sister or mother. And then we launch into the First Lesson. Oh man, it felt so strange to do something like that. It doesn't seem like something like that would "fly" in the States. We passed out pamphlets, we explained how the Church of Christ has prophets, apostles and the authority of God to baptize and teach the Gospel. Told them about Joseph Smith and the current prophets and apostles... It was awesome, though. It's not like we were aggressive, we just did what we would do while tracting: testify about the true restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. We taught four classes of different ages and the kids loved us so much. They wanted us to sign autographs and pose for pictures. The whole school was excited to have us there and it felt great.

Elder Carvalho, Danilo and I, before my first baptism in Brazil!

Second thing before I run out of time: my first baptism this Saturday! Danilo was perfect, man, just super elect and such an awesome, sweet guy. He really felt the Spirit. I didn't even know I would do the baptizing until ten minutes before, so I jumped into the clothing and quickly memorized the words in Portuguese, and everything went great. We don't have a font here, just this big tub of water in the backyard. It felt very spiritual though, with everyone surrounding this tub of water, and it was done very well. Danilo was so excited and had this little smile on his face the whole time. It was very powerful for me as well. I was so happy! I can't wait to do it again. I sent pictures of Danilo, he is twenty one, very quiet, but his testimony is growing very rapidly. I can't wait to see the Gospel bless his life.


Well... Connor, do you remember our house in Arizona, the first time we lived there, when we used to sit on that carpet by the small TV and play Mario 3? For hours and hours at a time, going through all the levels listening to that awesome music? That's the memory I choose this week. We've come a long way, eh?

I love all of you so much! Thank you for your prayers and your great examples!

Your friend, son, relative, brother,
Elder Brendon Carpenter

11-02-2009 Letter Home

A Week under the Southern Cross!

Ola! From Juazeiro!

Wow, first week proselyting here in Brazil. It has been very interesting and fun. Elder Carvalho, my first companion in the field, says that for a missionary to be happy he needs to be doing three things: either finding (the street contact), teaching, or baptizing; and none without too much of the other. Well, it is definitely true. When I come home after being able to teach a few lessons and/or write down a few more names in my planner to visit later, I feel great. Wednesday I was showering off all the dust after being able to teach three different families the first lesson, with one investigator committed to baptism, and I felt fantastic! So fun to be out here. Last week I was kind of down because I got here on Saturday, and then on Sunday and for our P-Day on Monday little work got done. On Sunday SO many people here are out of town, visiting relatives or on short trips. It's the only day most people have off. So its very hard to work on Sundays. As for our P-Day, its great to be able to relax now after an exhausting week, but last Monday when I was so ready to get to work, not being able to, kind of stressed me out. So, that's really why I was down a lot. The conditions down here are very different, the quality of life, but I have gotten used to a lot of it. I think things will only get better.

The road outside my house. Tells you a lot, eh? Sorry, that's all I could capture so far of Juazeiro.

Really quick, this computer is very slow and I will be lucky to get a few videos out and this message, so I will have to apologize in advance for not being able to respond directly to any questions. I'll do that next week, after reading the printed up e-mails.

Okay, lets see, when I first got to Fortaleza, as they were caravanning all of us "greenies" (new missionaries) to the mission office, what did I see? Dude, horses. They ride horses here, the poorer people, in the streets, or pulling wooden carts. Saw a bunch of kids guiding a couple horses around a hill. During the week I have seen many mules and horses and donkeys just tied out in the street. Really weird. It's not common, but they are around. It's strange not to see someone using a beast of burden once or twice in the day. Cars are often small and old, but you see a truck or shiny new car every once and a while. People ride motorcycles or bicycles as often as cars, which makes traffic a lot more crazy. It's not strange to see a man, his wife, and a kid or two riding on a bike down the street. They have buses here, but much more common is a kind of independent van/bus that are cheaper. There was one night I was crammed into a van, standing of course, with twenty or thirty other people inside. Just a van full of people hurtling through the streets of Juazeiro. Cool huh? Transportation is a big problem here for the church... they have to bus all the members and investigators from Barbalha to the branch (church) here, and not too many people from the other side of the city want to travel all the way to our branch because it would cost them a lot of their income. Thankfully, the new chapel is being built in the center of the city, where many more people will be able to access it.

Coconuts are big, fleshy, and green here, no hair like the Pacific kind. They sell them for the equivalent of seventy-five cents here, complete with a drinking hole and straw. There are so many empty coconuts everywhere... in the gutters, in the street, in the park. Juazeiro doesn't have that good of a public waste disposal program, so there's always tons of coconuts everywhere.

Brazilians here on average, are much shorter. It is strange not to be a head or two heads taller than someone else.

A lot of African influences here. It is not very common, but you see someone carrying a huge load on just their head every other day. Wish I could take a picture of that.

There is a holiday here that lasts for a week... people make promises to God that if they will be healed of a malady, that they will come to this festival in Juazeiro. If their leg was gimpy and it gets better, they bring a wooden leg to this church here. For other diseases, other carvings of wood. Interesting, huh?
Anyway, there is SO MANY PEOPLE HERE EVERYWHERE!!!! For the festival. Busloads and busloads. Tons of vendors of huge sprawling flea-markets that all of the sudden consumed squares and streets, every open area is filled with crowds and people trying to make money off of them. Its been really crazy.

I hope Halloween was fun! Please tell me all about it. I hope you'll send me some pictures of Kaitlin especially. I was lying on my bed at about 6:00 your time just thinking of you guys heading out to go trick-or-treating and I wanted to be there so bad.

Man, this computer can't upload my videos! Dang it dang it dang it. It will get to you eventually, I hope.

Last Saturday Elder Carvalho and I were walking back to our place and he suddenly turned around to talk to this guy in a nice truck. I didn't follow much of it but we wrote down his address. He turns out to live in a very nice neighborhood here called Novo Juazeiro, and has an actual lawn and driveway behind this big wall. He owns a grocery store here. He belongs to an Evangelical Church and some friend was randomly there from that church. So they open their Bibles and Elder Carvalho and them began Bible bashing for around two or three hours. Elder Carvalho says that he believes in some situations its okay to do so. He said that they were saying some really ridiculous things, like how the Old Testament wasn't really scripture nowadays, or how everyone in their Church was a prophet. Lots of other stuff I didn't pick up on. But they are a nice family. Brazilian culture is so funny... they were yelling at us at one point, but as soon as we started to close the conversation, they became very cordial and nice again. We talked about our families and lives, ate sandwiches and drank orange juice and then left... all after what I would call a very contentious episode. Anyway, the guy offers to drive us back to our place and while we were riding with him, he told Elder Carvalho that Saturday night, he felt like God had told him to stop us while we were walking by his truck and talk to us. God told him that if he didn't, that we would turn around and talk to him anyway. That's exactly what happened. After all we went through, the guy, Paulo, said that he knew there was a purpose we were there and he told us he wanted to see us again. Really spiritual. We feel that Satan was trying to stop us from teaching this guy, because he sent Paulo´s friend there that night, for a random reason (he was trying to sell him a mattress at the time we showed up). His friend was the one doing about 90% of the fighting, too. We feel very blessed that we have been guided to him, because he would be a great addition to the branch.

Otherwise, another memorable moment was teaching Danilo, who is 21 years old and lives in a small house filled with the meager possessions of his family. Feels like you are in a small tool shed, let alone a house. He had all of his personal possessions in a cardboard box, all of his clothes and things he uses in a day. Well, he came to Church the Sunday before I arrived after being invited by a friend. We taught him about the Apostasy and the Restoration, gave him a Book of Mormon, and he had this look in his eye like he believed it all. Every time we asked him a question he answered correctly and told us he believed what we were teaching. We asked him if he would be baptized and he agreed. Very elect, Danilo is. We are hoping this Sunday we will be able to baptize him. He could very well become the first of a large family of members here, and he is such a cool, kind person too. Not too much of a problem with "Word of Wisdom" issues either, which is huge here in Juazeiro where so many drink and smoke.

We have run into a lot of drunk people, by the way. Elder Carvalho and I were walking through the streets and this old bearded man comes up to me and gives me this huge bear hug and kissed me twice on the cheek with his big dirty beard in my face before I could pull away from him. He then pulled Elder Carvalho into a hug and kissed him close to his mouth. Yeah. We were laughing about that for quite a while after.

Pshah, gotta go. I love you all so much! Thank you for all the news and kind words from home! I will cherish it! Every letter has been or will be read by me but I will have to respond specifically later :(

@ Connor, wish I could talk more with you but I hope this will suffice. I love you man, am praying for you and hope you are doing well. I will read your letter tonight. Keep it up!

Love,
Elder Brendon Carpenter