Update

this is presidente d who is the second counsler in the stake presidência who lives up the street from us and we have family night in their house evey sunday cause we love them. 

What do you wear most days when you go out working – long sleeves or short?  Are you crazy? Sister cascardi made a new rule that you cant roll up your sleeves so I almost always work with short sleeves. I only wear long sleeves sunday cause it looks better with a suit

How do you pick out which tie to wear?  Its basicly how im feelin that day. But I try to wear them all before repeating. You know how it is.

What is something that many people have on the walls in their homes? hmmm I dont really understand the question but some people have those statues of saints to worship? or photos? Haha

Soooo Elder Costa!! We got to hear him and I really learned a lot about how I can better myself and better my teaching abilites. I got a really strong testimony that despite our falts and our weaknesses, God will still call us to do his work because we have things that other people need, be it, knowledge, teaching ability, a good atidude, ext...

This week was pretty good. It was hard to work and have some good results cause really we only worked thursday friday and saturday because we had to travel to Petropolis and then the LZ´s had to do some interview in Itatia so I went with Matos to do the interview so Cruz could work in our area and Jardime in their area. It was cool. 

buttt yeah sadly I have to go but I llove you guys!! miss you guys so much!!

Love, 

Elder hamm

Hump Day

Questions: 
How did the nail wounds in your hand heal up?  Suppppper sick. Haha but really it healed up nicely. 

Where do people go on vacation there? cabo frio, Angra dos Reis (man that place is sick just to look at the pictures of crystal clear beach waters)  

How often do you eat at members homes?  Here we eat lunch amost every day at a members house. Only like 3 times por week we receive money to buy things and eat in our house. 

Do you burn shirts at your hump day? I dont burn anything... actually thats a lie. But I dont burn anything of value because I am my fathers son and my dad doesnt like anything to go to waste. haha BUUTTT I do have some shirts that have permanant stains and one has a hole that I stitched shut so it looks like a bullet hit me and so yeah I might just burn a shirt at 1 year. Haha speaking of shirts I might have to buy some more because they are all stained with literally all sorts of stuff. 

You know cause in the moment I always try to help people like I see some old lady trying to cut down bananas and im like, "oh can I help?" (mainly because it looks super cool and kinda a challenge to cut them down) and theyll say "no youre in such nice clothes, youll get all dirty!" and thats when I say something I probably shouldn't like "senhora If I go home clean I feel like I didnt even leave the house to work that day." or "Do you think that Jesus went home every day, without a speak of dirt on his shoes?" and thats why all my shirts have stains. And another thing, Im not even ashamed of my stains! but really I think im gonna buy some more clean shirts. haha especially since on wednesday ill be seeing a member of the quorum of 70.

So yeah this week was good, you guys remember that green parrot from my last email? So we went over to their house again this week (they live wayyy in the boonies but we had someone to teach) and I was messing around with this parrot. So I put my finger on the edge of the cage and this dude sneakly comes over and pecks it. so I was kinda startled so I let out a "woooah" and whipped my finger back. So this parrot literally starts laughing like one of the most cynical laughs ever. Haha so I start playing with him and every time that he pecked my finger I would let out a little scream. So the dad calls my name and I look over and right when Im not looking this parrot bites my finger and hunks a chunk off! And then starts laughing!!! Hahaha so now I have a little hole in my finger from a parrot. 

So monday we played ball at O's house and her husband who passed away was a soccer player for flemango and then a famous doctor here in Barra Mansa so she has lets just say money to blow. So we get there and shes not even home. but we see this guy bbqing some food and hes like if you guys wanna eat now you can or you guys can play ball first. haha She payed some guys to cook food for us. Then we played some soccer and invited him to play. it was super sick. she had a pool too and it was SO freakin hard not to jump into that pool. but we played with water balloons so that was cool. 

So wednesday at night I will go back to my old area Cascatinha to sleep there for one night!! Then on Thursday I will listen to elder Claudio R.M. Silva give a talk to us about missionary work in Correas. so that should be sick. 

We also had a ward party for Junina! its basically like a country fest. haha its super awesome and we had a booth that was all about missionary work and we handed out 7 books of mormon and like 8 packages of the pass along cards. its freakin sweet Ill send you guys some photos. but I love you guys!! miss you guys lots!!! 

Also O and L are the two super nice kinda old ladies who keep putting photos of us on Facebook! we have a family night with them every sunday at like 5ish then they make us a dinner ish thing and dessert cause they live all alone and their granddaughters who live near them like the missionaries and arent members. Haha so basicly their freakin sweet and I love them ahha

so on the 23rd we have plans to stop working around 7ish and to go celebrate my 1 year. haha we have like 5 people from the ward and 2 of our investigators who will be baptized hopefully next saturday who are gonna party with us. hahah love you guys!! 

Elder Hamm

Missing Peanut Butter

What do you find that you don’t miss at all that you thought you would miss before you went on your mission?  hmm well theirs a lot of things I thought I wouldNT miss that Im missing...? Like peanutbutter. 

You said more people in your new area have cars, how are the drivers there?  They drive like they drive in India.. crazy. Motors swerving in and out of lanes and really with whatever rules they want. haha

 What music is on the radio there – do you hear US music as you walk around? They like Funk here its like super explicit with the same beat but they also like songs in english so I hear a lot of popular music on the streets here. 

Sooo lets start off with last monday, so right after we left the house we went over to the second counselor in the stake presidency and we had bbq! haha it was super good but a little different than the US. I´ll send you a pic. 

Then we went wayyyy out into the boonies for lunch this week and when we got there this family (who thinks im gonna marry their daughter who gets home from her mission in 20ish days) has a bunch of land and a parrot that talks like crazyyy.  its sick so its like 2 hours walking to get there so we take a bus. The only problem is that the only bus that passes there passes at like 11 and then again at 3 in the afternoon so we were there for 3 ish hours. so we visited some of their neighbors and stuff. haha but it was way sick i´ll show you guys a pic.

Then we also Baptized a lady who has 83 years!! Shes super awesome and the missionaries have been working with her for about a year and she just felt like she wasnt ready. So one day we were over there and she was talking to us about something random and I was already feeling like crap cause I was sick and stuff so I just wanted to go in on her and the spirit kinda hit me in the back of the head and was like, listen and you might learn something. So I kinda sat up and started listening to what she was saying and she was talking about a dream she had about a man in white and some big gates and stuff and in that moment I just started explaining that the man in white was my companion waiting to baptize her and that the gates are the gates of heaven and stuff and I just started to interpret
her dream just going off the promptings of the spirit. it was suppper sick and super spiritual. so yeah 

But yeah this week were going over to a hugggge house for pday to play some ball and chill out and stuff. The lady there is like 70 and lives alone in a mansion so this should be fun, well do some exploring and take some pictures. haha love you guys!! miss you all tons

Elder Hamm

Another Sprint

A former missionary visiting the area texted this picture to Mom,
"Just had family night with your son.  He's loving the mission, he's a hard worker,
and I really enjoyed getting know him in the mission!" 

When is the Brazilian independence day?  September 7th is their independence day. But my comp told me they dont really go crazy cause Theres no patriotism like American patriotism!

You said you were on a bus last week – is that how you get around your area most the time?  Do many members have cars? Man we were working like CRAZY last week but we had some really good results. Most of the time we walk cause the busses here are like 3,50 which is just stupid expensive. if were going to an area thats within 40 minutes of walking and want to take a bus, it would be cheaper to take a taxi. But our area is pretty big, the River divides our area, the LZ´s have one side and we have the other, thats slightly smaller but still pretty big. Its goes from Vista Alegre, till Presidente Vargras. 


Sooooo this week was still a dead sprint. But we had some good results. Something funny about this area is that I see some really large people. In Cascatinha there was no one fat cause everyone lived waaayyy up these stairs but here its all flat and i´d say about half the people here have cars (which is a lot).  

But yeah, let me just tell you about my favorite place in my area. Its called Villa Delgado. Its basicilly the most dangerous place here in Volta Redonda. Its next to the main road but theres one street in front, A bunch of houses with narrow hallways to the street behind all the houses, a little dirt then the Rio Paraíba.  So why do I love it so much? Because it started with one person we were teaching there and then we started teaching her brothers and sisters then they all invited their friends to see the American talk about Jesus and then one day we were there and I was talking to my comp and I was like, "C, I´ll give you 20 Reais if you grab one of those chickens." (there were like 20 chickens by the side of the street and the other side was the river) And C is like, "yeah right I´ll give you 40 if you grab one." So we gave our lessons and me and 4 of the kids there started trying to grab a chicken and before I knew it we had like 20 kids all running after chicken trying to grab one! So we became friends with all the little kids there and all the people there so its a neighborhood that I feel welcomed by everyone but the police which enter with guns raised every day, most days they´ll enter 4 or 5 times looking for drugs or money. OH mom I also adopted a dog here that I´m bringing home with me. hes a mix but super sick dog. I´ll send a pic next week.

But yeah this week we were able to Re-activate a mom and baptise her son C! Her other son is 7 but he said that when hes ready to be baptised he wants me to baptize him! Haha The big guy in the photo is my bishop and the guy next to me is Elder M. hes my LZ whos super chill and super awesome. The white elder next to C is J who is also super sick. We got a lotta love in our house. Haha but yeah This week was great and next week will be great too. We have a lady we already prepared for baptism but shes 83 and our water heater is out of gas so if we dont get some gas in the church before saturday shes literally gonna die in the font. So we´ll see how that goes. but yeah I love you guys!! miss you all so freakin much I´ll send some pics but you cant yell at me to cut my hair cause im gonna cut it tomorrow or this weekish. actually one of my investigators will cut my hair. but love you guys!!!

Elder Hamm

Woo Hoo

Questions from Dad: President H asked me what you did for breakfast and I’m pretty sure I have asked that but I didn’t remember the answer so here it is again – what do you eat for breakfast? Soooo for breakfast what they call it is cafe da manha. Which is really like chocolate milk and some bread with cheese or just bread with butter. sometimes I make barley. its actually really good, I bought it for one of my investigators who was addicted to coffee and ended up liking it so I drink that every so often now.  


Do all the LDS churches there have basketball hoops outside? No. But most of them have a court to play soccer and theres always a hoop on top of the goal post so yeah. 


But this week was pretty sweet. Me and C are working suppppper hard. We had some good times this week. 

So we visited this lady who was baptised 7 months ago but since then has kinda left the church and she shows me a picture of her daughter who is like 22 and I start casually asking about her family and stuff like that and she's like, oh my daughter moved away she doesnt live with me anymore, and then she's like, "shes pretty isn´t she?" And I didnt think anything of it, I was like yeah shes pretty. So she kinda laughs to herself quietly and that's when I kinda got that, "oh dang it" thought. So a few days later we come back and lo and behold her daughter in that photo lives in the house above her mom and she says, lets go meet my daughter! So im thinkin sweet another lesson and another person we can invite to be baptized. When we get up there and Z, (the mom)  calls her daughter and says, "This is the Elder who liked your picture so much and called you cute." I literally got this stale face -__- and look over at my comp who's cracking up. And I look over at Z and im like "So this is how your gonna be, eh?" And Z starts laughing so hard she almost dies and the daughter has no idea whats going on hahaha. And I was just like, pleasure to meet you, Im that Elder. ahaha But she was really sweet.

Hahaha so my comp Elder C is new on the mission and has a fear of talking to people on the street like making contact, which is normal everyone has this fear at the beginning of the mission. But one night we were doing contacts on the street and I had like 20 and he had 5 so I kinda said a prayer and I just started receiving some MAD revelation and Im like, lets get on the bus C. And he had no idea what was going on. So we get on the bus and he sits down and I go talk to the guy who takes your money as you get on the bus and I said, "do I have to talk to the bus driver if I wanna make a announcement? like about our work?" And hes like, "I dont think so..." Sweeet. So I go to the middle of the bus and I just start talking in a super loud voice. "GOOOD NIGHT PEOPLE OF BARRA MANSA! (C looks embarrassed for me) My name is Elder Hamm and Im here with Elder C and we´re missionaries from the church of Jesus Christ. I have this card with our number and a photo of Jesus Christ that im gonna give you guys WHILE my buddy Elder C explains a little about our work." And C just stays quiet.... Hahah im like "Pode falar C." hahaha and he gets super red and stands up and starts talking. hahahaha.  He still has a little fear of stopping people but now he knows that if he doesnt I´ll get on the most crowded bus I see and just to do this again. haha

But yeah the work is great. I love the mission. I´m living with the ZL´s so thats a little different but I love them to death and they are super chill. Theres 4 of us in this house and the house is pretty sweet. Its gonna be even sweeter when I build a barbeque pit. Haha a really ghetto barbaque pit with like 8 bricks and the oven rack. But im psyched. Our house is really open like most houses here in brazil so we have like a patio and stuff where ill put the bbq grill. bbq is a little different here they get slabs of meat and put seasoned rock salt on it and and cook it over charcoal. Its pretty good. They also have linguesa which is like chicken or pork packed inside of pig intestines. its good. haha Love you guys!!!

Elder Hamm


ps. SUNDAY MARKS JUST ONE MORE YEARRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!! dont get trunky on me guys. BUT IM COMMIN HOMEEE. in a year seriously guys stay calm. haha

Barra Mansaaaaa

Where is your companion from?  My comps from freakin São Paulo!!! I freakin love Paulistas man!! I love their slang, I love their accent I just love it man so Im supppper excited to keep working with Elder C. He is awesome!

What is a big difference between your new and old areas? weelll in my new area the members here actually really help with the missionary work and you can just tell that there is a HUGGGEEE difference when your working alone and when your working with members. That and my area here is flat. There are no hills or mountains here so thats a blessing.  Its like 20 degrees (Celsius) here at night but during the day it can be 34 or 20 so you never really know.  haha

Sooo I dont have a lot of time but just to sum it up. I went to a training on how to train with the pres so that was cool. Then I got here on wednsday? (I think, it was quarta feira) and we just went to work. Elder C is sooo sick and its hard to go from an area where you know everyone and everything to a area where you know no one and nothing. But C kept pushing me along it seemed for the first few days and now we're just at a dead sprint. We have been working like crazzzy!!! Our numbers for 4 days were as good, actually better, then a week of working in my last area. But I wanna tell you about this woman we were teaching this week,

So my comp, who im training has the responsibility of inviting people to be baptized. Yeah, the newbie on the mission has the sole responsibility of giving the most important invite that they will receive in their lives. That just shows how crazy the mission is. But we were teaching this lady and she had some doubts about whether she wanted to really take our lessons or not cause she has a 4 year old son who she loves a lot and her mother in law hates her and is trying to destroy her relationship with her and her son and she said she was worried that if she took our lessons and got baptized her mother in law would say something to her son about the church being of the devil and stuff so I just went IN bearing my testimonry saying, "I dont know what your going through, and I dont know about the situation you're in, but as a representative of Jesus Christ I can promise you that this church will only help your relationship with your son." And about the importance of families. man it was so crazy. The tears just started flying as her and I, and everyone present felt the spirit and the love that our Heavenly Father has for each one of us. It was really, overwhelming to see my words touch someone with such force. I know that this work Im doing is really important and that this church really can bless people with more happiness and peace in their lives

I love you guys! ill try and write a little more next time but I love you guys sooo much!!! miss you all

Elder Hamm

Barra Mansa

This is how big the avocados are here! 

Dad´s questions: 

Do they eat popcorn there?  Yes. Its like the same as the U.S.

Do they have shave ice? Not that I´ve found... but they do have a syrup that you put in water to make like a juice and I found that if you put a little extra of that juice in a bottle with a little less water and stick it in the freezer it´ll be like a slushy... That, and our freeze is kinda broken so it doesnt really freeze things...  

What is the best thing about your current apartment? Hands down its the chairs. Yeah, Sister spent a shinny penny on the chairs that we sit in to study. They are black and are wheely chairs and they have a spring in them so they recline and if you put your feet on the desk and lay back you can literally sleep there perfectly. Ive done that about 5 or 6 times. I was just too tired to make it to the bed sometimes and i fell asleep in the chair with the lights on and Howard did the same thing. I woke up at like 3 in the morning and went to my bed to grab a blanket and then went back to the chair haha. its sick

Sooooo yeah, This week is just full of stuff. So first, I got transfered!!! I will be going to Barra Mansa where I will finish training a new missionary. Its kinda funny cause out of the 9 zones only 3 are here in the state of Rio and as of now, Ive served my whole mission in the state of Rio. Im not complaining cause I like these grumpy people, I like the weather, I like the scenery, I even like the kids who look like they wanna rob me just cause I look american. But yeah I leave tomorrow at 10:15.

The rat came back! But this time, me and H were prepared... We boxed off the kitchen and I entered the kitchen and killed him. He was hiding behind the stove and it was super hard to get him out cause he was like stuck and pretty well boxed in. Buttt we killed him and then I took pictures. (which his mom did NOT post)   OH! I´ll also send you some pictures of a shirt I bought that is literally the sickest shirt I´ve ever bought in my life. like seriously Im in love. 

So this week we did a service project for a family that is investigating the church. So really theres this servidão (which is like a stair case going up a mountion with houses on each side) and we´re kinda teaching 3 families on this servidão and the one who lived at the very tippy top said that he needed some help moving A FEW sacks of dirt and stuff. 

So just a little background of Brazil life, If you do construction on your house, you have to haul everything down the stairs to the road so that a truck can come pick it up. So if you want to re-build a wall in your house, you first have to take it down right? Well in these servidãos theres no way for a car to enter or anything else, so you have to put all that cement and all that dirt that you are taking from your house in sacks, (sacks like potato sacks or dog food sacks) and haul it to the road so someone can come pick it up. 

So this guys literally took down like 4 walls in his house so when we get there its 4 in the afternoon. and we look there and he literally has something like 80-90 sacks of just straight broken cement and bricks that we have to haul allll the way down this servidão to the street. Each of these sacks could weigh anywhere from like 40 to 50 pounds, so the easiest (pretty much only) way is to get someone to help you lift it up and put it on your shoulder and then just kinda bear the pain of 50 pounds of rocks on your shoulders, untill you hit the street. So we decided to make a firemans line and move everything to the middle of the stairs, then after make another firemans line from the middle to the end. So long story short we finish at 10 o´clock at night and I am literally dead tired. I literally could not stand afterwards, my shoulders were all bruised and my legs were dead so we grabbed a taxi to go home cause its late and I cant walk and when I get home, I literally grabbed a chair and put it in the shower cause I couldnt stand up... 

That was saturday, today is monday and my shoulders are all brown and blue and I can still hardly stand. It just makes you think about how different life is here. They buy groceries in bulk cause its such a pain to haul up the stairs so they normally buy like 2 weeks of food at a time. Just kinda put my life in perspective about how lucky we are in the united states.

I had to say some goodbyes this week that literally broke my heart, but thats life. At some point or another, youre gonna have to say goodbye. Not all good things can last forever.  I´ll attach the pictures here
! Love you guys!! Glad our families can last forever!