Olá Da Area De Português Norte

Olá meus amigos e families,

Estou na area nova agora, e eu amo muito!

I am in the new area now, and I love it a lot!

This past week has seemed less like a week and more like a month, but for very good reasons. On Sunday, Chris got the Aaronic Priesthood! It was such a cool experience having that as what what might be my last memory of him. He is so excited to be able to go to the temple soon and start doing work for his grandparents and other family members that have passed on. Saying goodbye to all of the great folks we were teaching was tough, but I know the new Elders over there are going to do some great things.

Elder Vess is now back home in Georgia, which is sad, but I am pretty happy for the guy. He had a full two years going from Brazil, back home, and then out here. And Elder Romero is going to be a great comp! He's a SoCal native that will eventually serve in Portugal. He's 10 months in but hasn't spoken in Portuguese yet, so we're both working hard to learn, understand, and speak the language. (It's also interesting trying to use our respective dialects, as Portugal Portugese and Brazilian Portuguese have some pretty big differences).

Most of our time has been spent driving around the North half of the mission meeting up with the members so we can practice the language. If people can't understand us and we can't understand them, there's not really much we can do. I'm quickly learning that I love Brazillian culture and Brazilian people, though. It's been amazing listening to the stories of these people: their conversion to Jesus Christ and the Gospel, how they came to live in the United States, and also hear their different accents. 

We don't have a working SIM card, so we're hoping and praying for that to come soon! Reaching out to folks without a telephone of any sort is a pretty big challenge, but we've still been getting along pretty well without it!

On Sunday we attended a Portuguese ward after a meeting with some leaders and then went to a dinner get-together with a few families. In total, there was a lot of Portuguese yesterday, and my head was aching by the end of it. The people we were eating with were very friendly and willing willing help, though,, so it ended up being really good. The brother that fed us was a pizzeria owner in São Paulo, so we got some of the best pizza I've ever had in my life. 

"And now I say unto you that the time shall come that the salvation of the Lord shall be declared to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people."

Mosiah 15:28

Love you all and hope you are all doing well! Thank you for everyone that has sent emails and letting me now how life's going for you all! Those really make my day!

Tchau!

Elder Lindsay

P.S. Oh yeah, we went to a butterfly conservatory for P-Day today.

P.P.S. We checked out a butterfly conservatory this P-Day, and last week Elder Vess and shared an M3 with my uncle's parents who happen to live in what is now my old area. Small world!