Pisca Pisca

We were trying to go to lunch sunday and it just started pouuuuurrrinnnngg rain like literally buckets of rain so we got soaking wet and it didnt help that I was already sick, but we were literally only in the rain for 30 seconds because from the bus to their house is 30 seconds but it was raining so hard we got soaked to the bone. But sister made this suppper good dessert thats like jello with apple and strawberry´s with a condensed milk, and milk creme. it was so good and reminded me of the U.S.... haha 

When do Brazilians start celebrating Christmas? wellll about a few weeks ago people started selling pisca pisca (christmas lights)

What are some of their Christmas traditions? hmm dunno. I guess we´ll see about that in a little. haha

Do most people have  Christmas trees and are they fake? Ive seen i think only 3 trees so far. One was fake the other was made out of a broom stick and 2 liter bottles, and the other was also fake. I also think its illegal to cut down pine trees here in brasil so that kinda puts a damper on things.

So M got baptised last week. She's honestly like a princess in a 60 year old body. hahaha shes super funny. But man was it a challenge with her but shes so happy to be a member now. she´s already been going to church for 5 weeks, already went to 3 baptismal services, 1 activity and is always at church at 8 when church starts at 9:30..... she's the best.

Soooo yeah this is by far my favorite picture in the whole world. This is me with 2 of my literal companions and one metaphoric companion. On my left is my trainer Elder L who was my second comp but taught me a lot about how to be a good missionary. In the middle is Elder C who taught me about paicente and how to really care and love your investigators, and Elder M... well I lived with him for 4 and a half months in Barra Mansa so I count him as my compainon. He has taught me how to really have fun and work at the same time. All of them are going home tomorrow :( and I remember thinking, Man when these guys go home, Im gonna be so freakin trunky because i´ll only have a few more months. Now that im here I dont really believe that its kinda coming to a close. It makes me so grateful for each of these guys and their impact they made in my life. Definitely will always remember these guys and keep in touch, but Im also so glad that I could be here to see them off. 

But yeah I had to wake up at 6 today to get these guys to the church at 7 for a auto suficcent class they have to take and then at 4 they´ll all come to the office to be interviewed and grab a few things and then they will go to dinner with the prez. then tomorrow they will all leave at 4 in the morning (which I have to help out with bags and vans and taxies to make sure everyone gets there) then I have to take my comp to the bus station and see him off around 12ish so when my comp arrives at 3ish in the afternoon we´ll go home to drop off his bags then go straight to the church because the newbies get here at like 9 in the morning and will go to the church at 4ish and we'll start the rotations and training at 4-6:30ish then that doesnt even give us one hour in our area because its like 40 min. bus ride away so we´ll come back to the ofice and ill explain how to pass references and stuff. so yeah. BUSY BUSY I HATE TRANSFERS. hahaha but seriously. its super busy. 

ohhhh MM I love youuuuuhoooooo

Do they eat potatoes there?  That is an important thing for an Idaho boy to ask. Yes they have potatoes. And everyone here thinks that Americans love potatoes, which is mostly true. 

The ward you are in now, are there a lot of converts or have most of them grown up in the church?  So in mostly every ward Ive passed there has been more converts to the church, then people born into the church. Its actualy really cool because every time we eat lunch at a members house, we can ask the conversion story of everyone there. 

Where do you go to write your email each week? We email in the office. I have a computer I share with Elder S and we have all of our photos on here and stuff and a desk where we work. Its pretty chill, we have a drawer full of snacks to eat when we´re hungry haha. 

So this week you guys will not believe what happened. So you remember that baptism date that fell though the day of her baptism? So we went to her house and were talking to her Sunday about baptism and stuff and how she needs the gift of the holy ghost and stuff and she was talking about how she doesnt know if she can continue in this church because she already is going to a church and her church is wayyy more easy to understand and she likes the chior there and stuff so I was kinda seeing how she doesnt really want to be baptized and so following the prompting of the spirit, in a very kind and loving way I explained to her that the church she was attending could not help her after this life, that they didnt have the complete authority from God to do these ordinances like Baptism and giving the Gift of the Holy Ghost. And I told her that one day she will have to explain to God himself why she chose to not follow the church of His son, Jesus Christ, when she knew and had a good understanding that this church is the only church that can give her salvation.  I proceeded to explain that we didnt have any hard feelings against anyone and that she was more then welcome to keep going to church because she is definitely welcome there. So we left pretty sad and more than once I wanted to go back to try and help her but I know that I can´t because we cant help her if she wont help herself.
So Sunday we saw her at church and I was like, well that was the least expected thing in the world. So I went up to talk to her and shes like Elder I decided that I want to be baptised. And my jaw literally hit the floor. I was so happy I was about to jump for joy and yell and scream but we were in the sacrament room before the reunion started so I was just like, "Wow congrats!! im so happy we´ll talk more after!!" So that was a miracle. but super cool. 

We are going to buy a christmas tree and lights to put up in the house today. im super excited. We sang a christmas song at church sunday so its officially CHRISTMAS TIME!! So yeah 



Love you guys!! miss you all so much!!
Elder Hamm

Yes Dad, they have milk here.

Yes Dad, They have milk here. But they don't refrigerate it.  haha But I'm pretty sure its still milk.  I refrigerate it when I get home because lukewarm chocolate milk is nasty.  

So, this week was a loooot of work, but its good for the soul. 

So this week I did something superrr cool, drum rolll please..... I got.... a... CPF!!! that pretty much means I am a registered person here in Brasil. This is a number for life so this will be the number I use whenever Im in trying to go to brasil or buy something online. So normally only Brasillians have this number but if an american has all his documents and goes to the receita federal and stuff he can get one too. I also kinda chatted it up with the girl at the front desk and I kid you not, instead of waiting 3 hours to do this it took 5 minutes cause she gave me a ticket stub that they literally called next... Haha what can I say, the smolder works on brasilinas too.

We had  2 of our investigators who were literally hours away from going into the font, back out of baptism for some unknown reason... It was suppper sad. But our third investigator was baptized! And i got to give her the holy ghost! And the two who didnt wanna be baptized still went to the baptism which and made me even more sad.  But we felt sad for one because she knew everything, knew it was important and knew that only The church of Jesus christ of Latter day saints has the authority to baptise for the remission of sins and decided that she liked her church better. It was sad for everyone.

we are just doin so much work here we are working with a suppppper cool family of 6 actually. G lives with R and they have 4 daughters ranging from the ages of 15 to 5. They are all just so awesome. Just that G wants to get married and R doesnt.... but we´re probably gonna baptize their daughters while they are thinking about if they want to get married or not. That should be some good incentives.

Yeah this is my buddie Thor.
We're just lookin at some other
dogs on the street.  Hes
super sick

this is us again. the dog he was
barking at didn't want him....
I'm glad I could be there for him
in this time of need.  *just a
photo observation, his arm is
literally as big as mine is.....

I also played with a saint bernard this week! He was freakin huge!!! So we get there to this ladies house and Im with Elder S and shes like yeah just let me put the dog away and shes like fighting with him in a narrow hallways and were a few yards behind her and Thor (the name of the dog)  pretty much shoves her aside and starts running after us and she kinda screams so me and S take off running to the gate cause if that dog bites your hand, its like from the elbow down this dog is so freakin big. So we run and slam the gate shut and we both are holding it shut while Thor is jumping on the gate almost knocking us down. Thats when we see the owner literally crying because of laugher. Turns out this dog doesnt bite. She just didnt want him to slobber all over us. Hahaha so we played with him after and took a few pictures. 

Love you guys!! 

this mango is literally the dankest little mango in the world. Its the size of your palm but its a lot sweeter and juicer. i ts delicious and i bought a bag because its in season

Elder Hamm

Liahonas

WOO got an investigator with a bunch of little birds

Which M&Ms are the best?  What? What kind of question is this? haha I like the ones with peanuts... but the mini are good too. 

What is your favorite Christmas candy?  ummm probably the red gummy berrys. you know the one that have the taste of sweedish fish but are actually like a raspberry.

Do most people have cell phones and text? Most everyone has a cell phone but no one really texts. Everyone has this app called Whatsapp. Its an app that uses the internet to send messages and call people so if you have internet all the other services for this app are free. after one year you pay 1 dollar (4 reais) and you can have all this free for another year. Here in the office we have special privileges... so we can send texts. only us and the assistants can send messages so its pretty special. 

How is your Portugese – you pretty much understand everything people say and can you say whatever you want to say? Yeah at about 1 year I havent had any difficulty understanding or not having words to say what I want. Its all just so natural now it comes out without even thinking, kinda like english. You dont really think to see if it makes sense you just open your mouth and start talking. 

Is it hard to remember English? It was before this area. But now I live with 4 other americans, 1 brazillian and 1 from peru. so we talk a lot of english in our house but at least a third of the words we say are in portuguese just out of habbit. Its kinda weird its like a mix between english and portuguese, porta-english.

So just to tell you guys a little bit about the weather here in Juiz De Fora. So when I wake up, its always a little cloudy. Then at around 9 the sun comes out from behind the clouds just enough to shine right on my study desk and so we have to close the blinds. At around 9ish the sun is behind the clouds again and we can open the blinds. Then at 10-2ish the sun is burning at about 35-38 degrees. Just hot enough to give me the confidence to leave my umbrella in the office. Then around 3ish theres a light rain with a cold breeze and then its cloudy the rest of the day untill 7ish when the heavens open and pour our rain like its the end of the world. So the last 5 days I´ve come home soaking wet.... oh Brasil. 

You guys will not believe who I saw at church Sunday, G!! MY buddy from tres rios!! It was a tearfull reunios knowing that he is now bishop! It was awesome. He was there to get a training from the member of the 70 who went to our stake conference. 

Sooo this week we were in the office and some lady from utah calls me and is like, can we send you some Liahonas from the year 2014? and I was like, are they free? and shes like yeah... so im like uhhhh sure? haha so the other day there's like 30 boxes here in the office and im like uhhh what is this? and Elder B says someone ordered 10,000 Liahonas and sent them here, I swear I dont remember getting this phone call..... hahaha long story short im glad that presidente was in Recefi for the week at a trainamento so we could stash the liahonas in the closet. 

Well I love you guys!! Miss you guys so much!!

Elder Hamm

Last Day of the Dead on the Mish Woot Woot

Do the folks there know American movies, music or television? yes. The movie industry in brasil really only makes a few movies popular. The rest are in english either dubbed over (which drives me crazy seeing peoples voices dubbed over) or have the little letters at the bottom of the screen.  

Do they have daylight savings time there? yes. it was like 3 weeks ago and we all got to church late.... because we forgot. 

Soooo this week we are emailing a day late because of Dia dos Mortos!! So the prez made a challenge that we have to get up at 8 and go to the grave yard all day and then leave at 6! So we called a bunch of members and they helped do contacts and pass out pamphlets and stuff. The grave yard was HUGGEEE and full of a lot of people! But it was cool because my buddie Elder Howard (who was already my comp) and Elder Ballard were there so we were joking around and doing contacts all day. We found some really cool people who wanted to hear our message too. 

So two weeks ago we knocked a door and this lady with CRazy hair came out and she looked literally crazy and im like "blah blah blah wanna hear a message?" and shes like yeah i do! and I look at my comp and he looks at me, and I look at him, and he looks at me, and im thinking, this lady isnt gonna understand anything.... that and we had another appointment in 30 minutes so I said "Lets do this, im gonna leave you our card with our number and our church is at 9:30 sunday! Go there and after you visit our church we´ll come over here and teach you. I was greatly surprised when she was the first one to get to church and we have since then taught her 3 times and she's going to be baptized on the 14. I judged a book by its cover and I felt really bad but im glad that she got the opportunity to hear our message.

We also built ANOTHER MEGA FORT. I´ll skip the details because its a little long and has a lot of other stuff.

but yeah that was this week, love you guys!!

Elder HAMM

Life in the Office. Working hard or hardly working....

Dad's questions:  

Getting settled into the new routine?  Any idea why you got the position?  Yeah things are good here. I share a computer with Elder S who's the other assistant and is super chill. I know exactly why I got this position. because when I got here Elder W was waiting in the bus station with my comp and i literally look at him with this stale face and he busts out laughing. it was him that begged the presidente to send me here cause we´ve been buddies for a while now. haha hes a goon. but its chill here. 

What can you tell us about Juiz De Fora?  Is it a really big city? Juiz de Fora isnt that big of a city. The center is pretty big and busy but our area is like a 20 minute bus ride from center and its like a suburb where there isnt that much hussle and bustle. its pretty calm. but Juiz de Fora is a beautiful city with even more beautiful girls. literally there are so many beautiful women here. its redicious.

Are there a lot of missionaries in the city?  yes. this city has about 6 pairs of missionaries, 2 are sisters.

Are there a lot of wards? Well im in the same ward as the AP´s and the other 2 secretaries share a ward with the sisters. so here in Juiz De Fora there are really only 2 wards. but they are growing fast.

Who else do you work with in the office? I work in the mornings so every morning, (not friday or sunday) we go to the office at 10-12:30ish to pass references to people, see if they contacted these references and help the other secretaries. I work with the two other secretaries and my comp, the financial secretary and the secretary of the mission which is Elder B, my buddy from the mtc in provo. The assistants normally only enter the office at tarde or at night. We work after lunch in our area while the other 2 secretaries come back to the office. So basically im calling half the mission every morning passing references and chatting with my buddies so its supppper chill. haha our phone is one of the 3 phones on the mission that can send texts and can call anyone in the mission so thats taking some adjusting to.

But yeah I have yet to see the presidente because he was off traveling to other parts of the mission, but I am loving being in the office. its super chill and everyone here is one of my friends from earlier on in the mission.

One hard part about it is we live next to the office, so all the newbies and the guys going home sleep in our house and last week we had the an [interesting] group of newbies in our house. They were all supppper loud and talking about how many people they're gonna baptize and how their dad was assistant and all that. Then they all walked suppppper slow so we were late taking them to a meeting with the assistants and president. but yeah the good news is this next group leaving will be Elder M, Elder C, Elder W, Elder L, Elder R, pretty much everyone I love on the mission will be going home the 1 of december and I'll be in the office to see all of them!! Thats a tender mercy. 

So the other night we built a mega fort in our house because we have like 20 mattresses and blankets and it was pretty much the best fort ive ever built. We had two rooms, one where we all slept there and the other was the War room where we played War the board game. haha it was awesome. We drank coke and ate candy too. ill send you a picture.

Also this week we taught this young mother about the Restoration. While I was trying to help this lady with her doubts about Joseph smith and if he really was a prophet using the Book of Mormon she really just wasnt understanding. So I was saying that the Book of Mormon is the key to know if all this is true and that she has to read it, at least one page, to know if the book really is sacred scriptures. She still had her doubts so I deicded to bear my testimony one last time about the joy this book brings into my life and while I was bearing it she kinda started laugthing and I looked at my comp and he was kinda smiling because she started laughing at random and when I asked what was funny she said, I can see you know this book really is true. I can see it in your eyes, there's almost like a flicker of flame in your eyes when you are telling me that this book really is scriptures. And I said, This is my joy. This is why i left my house, my family, my friends, for two years, because I know this book can help you. And she decided to take the challenge to read the book of mormon and ask God! it was sweet. 

Miss you guys!
Love,
Elder Hamm

Transfers

Do they celebrate Halloween there? If so, is it the same or different from here? no. Halloween doesnt exist here but everyone knows what it is and everyone would like to have a Halloween but you know there isnt really a council that will be like "this year all of brazil will be celebrating Halloween." So theres that.

 Are the soap and shampoo and toothpaste the same there? yes they have dove here and stuff and toothpaste is the same

 Do they have a holiday like Thanksgiving there? no. Thanksgiving doesnt exist also because it is a holiday that the pilgrums in north america invented. If they were to have a thanksgiving it would be 22 of april because thats when they found brasil.

SOOOO IM BEING TRANSFERED!!! :((((( So I cried like a baby when we had our last family night in the D's house. Everyone did. It was supppper sad saying goodbye to a Family that means so much to me. And M was there and A also. It was probably the saddest moment of my misison yet. But we're here in their house again using the computer here and had lunch here and we'll probably pass here tomorrow morning also. 

But saying goodbye to the D Family will be nothing compared to me saying goodbye to Elder M. I've lived with him for the last 3 transfers and he has been like a brother to me. He reminds me a lot like Josh and we just have this relationship where if he does something that annoys me or that I dont like and can tell him literally in the moment and he will give me a hug and apologize and it'll all be resolved. Its just a relationship where one isnt ever really mad at the other cause we just want the problems to be resolved so we can continue joking around and goofing off with each other. I dont know if I'll ever see him again but we have plans to build a hotel in Bahia so we'll see how that goes. 

So im going to be transfered to the zona Juiz De Fora (again, Tres Rios was also in this zone) in the area of Jardim America 2. I will also have the responsibility of being secretary of references where if people make a contact with someone in a different area they will call me and ill write down the address and pass it to the right person. I'll study and work in the office starting at 8 and ending at 2ish where ill go to work. I will live with the assistances to the presidente and the other secretaries (2 other people). So our house is the biggest in the mission and the area is super big and the members are strong there. Mainly because its the presidente's ward... haha so im excited. 

butttt yeah that was about my week. I love you guys!! I miss you all alot! Love,Elder Hamm