Nov 16 2009!‏

Hey guys!!

The internet isn´t working yet, so I hope I can send this to you guys today and you don´t worry about me. But anyway, I only have a little bit to tell you about my week! I actually got on before and read all your emails, didn´t have time to write, and now that I do the myldsmail site isn´t working. But I´m sure it will soon.

So, to tell you about the week! It was great! A couple of exciting things. Wednesday we had Zone Conference, which happens once every transfer, so it was my second. But it´s quickly becoming something I look forward to a lot! All the missionaries from our zone (the Cruz Alta area, a couple of surrounding cities and the 14 of us here) get together in our chapel. We have training sessions all morning from the President and his wife, lunch (it´s really silly to like this part so much, but the Relief Society always makes amazing food!) and then after, everyone gets interviewed by the President to see how we´re doing and such. While other people are being interviewed, the rest of us have music lessons and other fun stuff with the President´s wife. And the last two Zone Conferences are where I´ve gotten your packages!:) So it feels like a holiday or something.

Thank you so much for everything you sent, by the way!! I was so happy to get your letters and everything. I even got one batch of letters that you sent to the MTC back in August!! So it was fun to hear about everything going on back then. I still need to go through the letters and see everything you asked about so I can respond. This week it felt like I literally had no time! But I´ll answer them next week. But thank you so much for loving me and supporting me and sending me your thoughts everything!

So what else happened this week? Zone Conference was great to reenergize Sister Raphaela and I, after last week we were a little….just lacking in energy or something. But now we´re both doing a lot better. So the week was good!

But what´s something exciting that I can tell you about? We had a very memorable experience in which we taught a pastor! One of those things that´s cool among missionaries, “Whoa, you taught a pastor? Crazy!” But I don´t know if it seems quite as cool to you guys! But it was so interesting, we´ve been teaching this man named Inacio, about 50-ish, who belongs to an evangelical church. So he´s always really interested in seeing where things are in the Bible, etc. So when we showed up this week, he said “Oh hey, my pastor wants to talk to you guys! Can I call him now?” So we said sure, he called and said “The Mormon girls are here!” and his pastor came over. It was very interesting, he told us how it was a “lack of etiquette” to teach someone who already had a pastor – basically we were “stealing his client” (not his words, but what it sounded like). So we said we never force our way into anyone´s house, we were there because Inacio invited us in, and if he didn´t want us to come back we wouldn´t. But Inacio said “No, you´re welcome whenever you want!” right in front of his pastor. Yay for him! But Pastor Jose got kind of angry, just saying like, “You´re girls! You can´t tell me things like that! I was preaching before you were born!” and stuff, but as we were leaving Inacio said again, “You can come back whenever you want.” So that was exciting!

It was such an interesting experience, to think about how other religions have “pastors” and such who are professional ministers, maybe even have gone to school to be such, etc. And we´re just “girls” as he said, who decided to give up our lives for 18 months to walk in the rain, eat cow heart, ask to come into people´s homes and chat with every type of people imaginable…And yet, we were called by a prophet of God to do it, and have authority to teach, the same way Christ´s apostles did. It´s really incredible to have this responsibility, and all the blessings that come with it too. Who would have ever thought that I´d be here in Brasil, having all these crazy experiences, trying to avoid Bible bashing while talking to a pastor? What a crazy 18 months!

But everything´s great here! I´m doing really well, totally happy and healthy. Trying to make the most of this last week of the transfer! We found out for sure at conference that we´re both leaving, this area will be “closed” for sisters for a while, and two elders will be taking our place. So we´re trying to leave this area in perfect condition, perfect records of all our teaching, and we´re trying really hard to mark the marriage dates of Cirlei and Elenice, two women who want to get married so they can be baptized. So this last week will be crazy trying to get everything done!! But I´m excited. It will be exciting to go to another area and have another companion, but I´ll miss Sister Raphaela like crazy!! She´s really the greatest companion I could ask for, and I´m sure I won´t always be so lucky, but I know I can get along with anyone I´m paired with. So next Monday when I write I´ll be able to tell you which area I´m going to and who will be my new companion!!

It was so good to hear from you guys, I´m so glad you´re doing well! The video of Caroline dancing was ADORABLE! I can´t believe how big she is, that she´s crawling so fast, and dancing…wow!! It was so great to see her and Katie in the video, and Beatles Rock Band looks amazing!:) Thanks so much for sending videos and pictures. I love you all so much, and can´t wait to hear from you again! Keep cheering for the Utes for me even though they lost to TCU. Oh and hey, when you get a chance, I want to see pictures of Caroline from Halloween!!

Big hugs to everyone, mom and dad, Katie and Alex, huge squeezes for Caroline, a big glass of ice for Grandpa, Grandma, Marla, Bruce, Ashley and Chelsea (I finally got the letter they sent in August!), Andy and Leyla (what an adorable picture of them! Thanks for always writing me Leyla, and I promise to write back soon!) And give Grandma Madsen a big hug too and tell her to get feeling better! I love you all so much, you´re always in my prayers. Til next week!

Love love love,

Heather