Church Ball Mania!

Well, another church ball season is in the books!  David's team did extremely well this year in the regular season - only one loss to a team they ended up beating two other times.  David played the end of the season with a sprained ankle from Jr. Jazz and could have easily have ended his high school baseball career if he would have re-injured it, but luckily he didn't.  The team really gelled this year and I think they all had a lot of fun!  I don't know of too many other things that elicit more passion, from the players as well as the parents and coaches, than church ball.  It seems to be life or death once the game starts, even though everyone is given the talk at the beginning of the game about going out there and showing good sportsmanship and just having a lot of fun.  Then, they go to battle for forty minutes!  We have seen some really great games and some really great sportsmanship, and we have also witnessed complete meltdowns by players and parents in a high stakes game.  I guess that's what makes it so enjoyable!  The boys made it to the second round of the playoffs and played their hearts out!  The last game was against David's good friend Andrew's team, and with Andrew on the team, we knew they would be tough!  The players exhibited excellent sportsmanship throughout the game.  The refereeing was a little (well, maybe a lot) questionable and that seemed to get the parents and coaches going at each other, a little.  Pretty soon, parents and coaches were yelling at the refs, at each other and all you know what broke loose!  The Bishop from the opponents ward got in Dave's face and accused him of yelling things that he wasn't.  Their coach started mouthing off at our coach and players and acting like he was twelve... anyway, you get the picture.  We ended up loosing the game, but it wasn't for a lack of trying.  I was so proud of our team and how hard they played.  All in all, it was a pretty darn good season, even if it did end a little strangely.  But, that's church ball for you!

Week Thirteen - One Month in the Field!

Happy to hear that my son sounds happy!  He's eating bananas and pears, but no strawberries, oh well.  This e-mail came to me today, so he is getting the hang of the timed e-mail system.  I hope every week things get a little easier for him and seem a little more "normal".  Love these e-mails!

Bom Dia Everybody!
       I hope everyone had a good week! Mine was pretty good. But to start, I do not like THESE COMPUTERS! GAH! so annoying. I had 10 seconds left to send the e-mail home last week but could not find the stinkin send button. The screen was too small and had about a dozen scroll bars. The one I am using now is better. It is bigger and the send button is within view right now, so I don´t have to try and find it when I only have 10 seconds left, again. If you don´t receive an e-mail by about 2 o´clock, check my e-mail account. So yeah this past week was pretty good. We made a companionship exchange for a couple days with some other more experienced elders. I went with Elder Nunes, who has a year and four months in the field, and stayed at his place with him, Elder Shaw, and his companion. Man, their place is small. Makes me happier for what I have now, but I sure do miss the luxuries of home and the slaves that parents have to be sometimes :) hehehe. But yeah, Elder Santos went with my companion to try and help out in our area since we are not having a whole lot of luck. Elder Santos finishes his mission this month. That must be exciting! Its difficult not to think of the end of the mission, even though mine has only just begun. Anyways, Elder Nunes is really cool. He listens to a lot of the same music that I do and he´s fun to talk with. And you can tell Elder Shaw is really happy to be here, serving a mission.
     Not much else happened this past week. We do have some investigators progressing a little. One of them agreed to be baptized, but we need to teach her a bit more and she needs to go to church at least once I think. We were going to take her yesterday, but... we didn´t exactly forget to get her and go to church with her, but to put it simply... we forgot. :( Another investigator agreed to be baptized when she feels she has received an answer to her prayer, that the church is true and Joseph Smith is a prophet, so hopefully she receives one. And there is one family that my companion, Elder Reis has been working with for like the past 3 months that haven´t been making much progress, but 2 people in the family feel that they might have finally received an answer, so I´m really hoping they act on that and choose to be baptized. So yeah, that's our progress on getting people into the church.
     So yeah, things are good here, muito legão. I think its a good idea that you send me another card for the camera and I will send you the one I am using now home. I´m going to try to write letters home, but they will probably be sent one at a time because we can only write letters on p-day and I will send the card home with one of the letters. By the way, thank you to those that sent me letters. I think they were all a little behind but I received a letter from the Nielsons, Sister Peterson, G&G Williams and a package from G&G Pratt through Mr. Cheyneys. So thank you very much. I really appreciate it and am glad to hear things are going good at home. And thanks for all the words of encouragement in the letters and e-mails. They help a lot.
      I am glad to hear that dad wasn´t sick for long and he is good now. Toby! look here Toby! Do something funny!... read that to him will ya? I´m also glad to hear that churchball went okay this season. Ma! Church ball will return so fast ya won´t believe it. And I will only miss one more season of church ball so don´tchya worry about it!
Question Answering Time!
1) no, I have not received the package with vitamins and a towel. Hopefully it gets here soon and there will be some good snacks in it :)
2) I can get fruit. Lots of fruit vendors in Belém. There bananas are so delicious and sweet! Yum, Yum, muito bom! (very good). I had a pear for the first time since Rosie baby-sat me. It was okay but not as good as I remember. Theres also a lot of fruit here that I can never remember the name of. But one good one is called cupuaçu or something like that (the c with the squigly below makes and s sound and all the u´s make the hard u sound... thought I would share that with you). But I have not seen strawberries. I don´t think they have them here. Darn!
3) P-day, P-day, P-day, what do I do on P-day? Last week we played uno! My roommates thought that the only color I knew how to say in Portuguese was red (vermelho) because when you can choose which color you want to play, I would only choose red, but that was because almost all of my cards were red. But I proved them wrong, mwahaha... Azul, Verde, e Amarelho (blue, green, and yellow). Colors in portuguese, BAM! I usually just sleep, sometimes I draw cartoons, but I might start trying to study a bit more... because... I need to study.
4) We can only wear missionary attire outside the house, unless we have a service project, so don´t worry about sending any clothes.
5) The tie in the picture of me in front of the temple, I got for Christmas. The peeps at the MTC gave ties to all the elders. Its a pretty nice tie, wearing it right now. I also bought 2 ties while at the MTC. A green one and an orange one. Pretty good lookin ties, I say, I say, pretty good lookin ties...
         I´m glad to hear you are proud of the fact that I cook a little now... I made some chicken nuggets too, but my list of things I cooked is no where near as grand as the list of food I have eaten. I will send a list home when I write letters to ya´s. But don´t worry about sending more foods and stuffs. If I need something I will ask for it but I am good for now, thank you very much. For my birthday... hrmmmm what do I want for my birthday.... Eu não sei ( I don´t know, Eu is pronounced like the letters A and U put together, não is like now, and sei is like say). Maybe just hugs and kisses and loves through the mail.... and some candy.... and a tie. Anyways, I have 6 minutes left, I will end a little early so I know you receive this e-mail. I love and miss you all and am praying for ya´s! Have a good week and I will talk to you again next week!
Month 1, in the field, over (almost). Success! Over and out!
      
        Love, Elder Williams.

Week Twelve - Carnival

My handsome son in front of the Sao Paulo Temple

 Once again, I waited and waited for Tom's e-mail, got impatient and went to his in-box 

and there it was as a draft!  He had pictures attached, though, and he still sounds good!

It was so exciting to see pictures of him and to see a smile on his face!  I sure miss this 

boy but I know he is growing like crazy and it makes us so happy for him!   

I will send some pictures to you really quick and try to talk about the mission after. 
The computers are really slow here and take a long time for pictures to load, so I will 
talk a little bout the mission while the pictures load. There's a some flowers you can 
paint if you want Emmy!

      Sorry about last week! I was literally saying goodbye and about to send the e-mail 
home when I ran out of time and was kicked off the computer. Ugh, that ticked me off... I 
thought it would ruin my day but, it was still okay, and I am glad you were able to read 
it and that you enjoyed it. Don´t worry about looking at my emails ma! if you don´t get 
one its probably because this happened again and I give you permission to look.
      So, its hot here. I am usually sweating before we even leave the house. And it 
rains a lot. I don´t think there has been a day where it didn´t rain at least a little 
yet. But when it rains it feels nice, it cools me off a bit, unless its raining really 
hard, then we find a place to stay out of the rain. Things are kind of difficult, here. 
The members of the church are supposed to help us find new investigators and that is what 
my companion is trying to rely on but most people say they don´t have a reference for us. 
My companion says that the area of Belem we are in, Arsenal, is kind of difficult because 
its a bit bigger than other areas, and even one member of the ward here says that the 
other members aren´t very helpful. We are praying for help so hopefully things will get 
better. This past week we did a lot of walking. I think at the beginning of every month 
we have some zone meetings for training at the church every morning for a couple days, 
and the church is like a 20 minute walk away, or 10 minutes if your companion walks as 
fast as he can. Fortunately  he only did it once so it was okay. Lots and lots of 
walking...
    The language is coming along okay. I definitely understand more now than when I first 
arrived. I´m not sure if I already said this in my last email, but there are somethings 
people say that I can understand without even having to think about it but others its 
just like..... -.-...... wut? and then they say "He understands nothing," in 
Portuguese of course, and just laugh at me. So its a little embarrassing but it doesn't 
bother me much. Anyways, we have a few people that are showing interest in the church. 
Some people have come up to us and talked to us a bit but most of the time when they do, 
they are a little crazy. After someone talks to us I ask my companion what they said and 
he says "I don´t know, he´s crazy," which has happened a couple of times, so 
its kinda funny.
    Carnival was... I think last week. I don´t think its a huge deal here. There were 
about 100 people walking through the street following a truck with music just blasting, 
and tons of people just set up giant stereos outside their home and have it blasting as 
loud as possible, too. And then there are some cars that just drive around all day with 
speakers set up on top of their car with more music blasting, and a lot of the music they 
play here is Portuguese covers of English pop songs so its kinda annoying, but not that 
carnival is over, there aren't a lot of people blasting their music anymore. But I saw 
one huge truck with HULK SOM (sound) painted on it and the incredible hulk also. Man, 
that was loud. During carnival we didn´t have to stay in the house all day but we did end 
it an hour earlier. My companion says there's lots of thieves during carnival that want 
money to go to where the party is and buy beer.
     Sorry to hear about Dad, I hope you get better soon and I will be praying for you! 
But I am glad you and Em are finding things to do and having fun. Haha, toby is so funny, 
I love hearing about what he´s doing... But I´m glad I don't have to be there to clean up 
the mess he made. And I am glad to hear about Clay and Cooper and Brady, congratulations 
to them! Muito legão (very cool, pronounced lay-gow, like cow but with a g)
    I will now answer your questions really quick.
1) pizza, I just buy some flat bread, some tomato sauce, and some pre sliced cheese. My 
companion did show me how to start the stove (I was nervous!) and I made some chicken. 
I´m going to try to make some scrambled eggs next! Wish me luck!
2) Walking is difficult but getting easier, don´t worry about it!
3) I live with one other companionship, cool guys, and every Tuesday we have a zone 
meeting at the church where we talk about the week and learn a little bit. cool stuff!
4) local super market, lots of stuff to buy, don´t worry about it!
5) shoes are good! don´t worry about it!

Anyways, I love you all and can´t wait to talk to you again. Wish me luck this week and I 
will be praying for yall. Bye!

Elder Williams

Week Eleven - I Understand THAT.....

 This e-mail never came on Monday, but I went in and stole it from Tom's account Monday night..... I think his one hour time limit may have cut him off before he could sent it.  It's a funny, funny e-mail and I knew Tom had a good sense of humor, but it seems to be really coming out in his e-mails home.  I was so relieved to find this.... being a mom, of course I imagined the worst all day when his e-mail didn't come. 

Hello Everyone!

      I am glad to hear that everyone is still doing good. Things here are pretty good too. Last week we had a baptism, well two, but only one was one of our investigators. His name is Rafael, he´s pretty cool. I think he´s been seeing the missionaries before I arrived, which is why he was baptized the second week I was here, but it was cool to be able to teach him. I´m not sure how much of what i said he understood and I didn´t understand anything he said, for the most part, but it was still cool and he´s a great guy.
     But this past week was a little difficult. We met two people that showed interest in the church, and we taught them a little, but when we asked them to pray to know the truth, they say they don´t feel anything special so they will just continue to go to their church. And there was another person who I thought had some interest because he even helped us teach his mother a little bit but when my companion called to see if we can come over and asked for him, my companion is told he is not home and when asked who was calling he said a soccer buddy, and after he said that, they said "oh, okay, I will get him..." So we don´t have a whole lot of people to teach right now. We´ve pretty much just been walking around this last week. But my companion said that for his first 2 months of the mission, he didn´t have any baptisms and had very few people to teach, so they just walked around most of the time, so I feel a little bit better but when the mission president is pretty much demanding one baptism a week and 250 per month, it gets stressful.
     Anyways im not having any trouble trying new food. The food at the members house is usually good. I´ve been told that I am very white, a lot, and when they ask me something and I don´t understand, they say "he understands nothing..." and I´m like... "I understood that..." (I don’t actually say it) so it’s hard and a little embarrassing, but whatever... The members are all really nice and willing to help. Some of them speak slower if I ask them to, sometimes my companion says what they are trying to, because I understand him much more than anyone else, and sometimes they just give up trying to talk to me. :/
    The area that I am in isn´t very nice looking. A lot of people just throw their trash on the street and the garbage trucks come by and have to shovel what they can and pick the rest up with gloves on. And a lot of times the dogs are always digging into the trash looking for food. There are a lot of cats and dogs around here that seem to be without owners, but I don´t know for sure, and many of them are not very healthy looking, they have cuts and scratches, and are limping a little bit. Its pretty sad to have to see that every day.
     Elder Funk was in Provo for 8 weeks, came to Brazil for his 9th when he got his visa.

 And yeah, I will at least see the other missionaries of my district serving in Belém (the state of Pará) with me, but the others are all serving in other  states, 2 in Curitiba, 2 in Belo Horizante, and 1 in Teresena.

    Good to hear David is really enjoying his senior year, and that he is doing stuff with Landon more. Try to do stuff with all your friends and don´t stop talking to any of them. I had some friends that I wish I still talked to after high school, and now that I don´t I really regret it. :/ Anyways, Toby is soo funny. :) I love you TOBY!  DON´T YOU DARE change my room! DON´T YOU DARE!... just kidding, that’s cool, grandma and grandpa can use my room, I don´t care. :) It is better than what happened to Elder Fox´s room. They changed his into an office, permanently. Haha, that sucks, but I don´t think he minds too much. His ward also split and his family is part of the ward that he knows no one in, lol... I hope that doesn´t happen to us. Changing David´s room is neat. It´s going to be weird coming home to a different house, well, a little different. Enjoy the snow for me! por favor!!

  I have not been given any pills for malaria, but I have had some weird dreams. But dreams are unimportant and I don´t have much more time...
      I have had a small cough since moving into the apartment. It doesn´t bother me though and its nothing to worry about. I´m guessing it is from swallowing some of the water when I brush my teeth. My companion said I don´t need clean water to brush my teeth, so I´m trusting him. I have 3 super small warts that don´t seem to be going anywhere right now, not getting bigger or smaller. Hopefully the stuff I have will clear them up.

  My companion is from Bahia and he´s been in the field for about a year and three months now. He doesn´t speak English but he uses Portuguese words I understand all the time and speaks slow enough for me to understand.

  I am feeling a little better about the language. There are some things people say that I don´t even have to think about to understand, but for the most part they need to repeat themselves once or twice.
  The weather is okay. I think it has rained every day so far, at least a little bit, and it does get pretty hot. I am usually sweating before we even leave the house. But I was told that right now in Belém, it is winter, and it rains everyday during the winter. But in the summer, the sun beats down on you for about 2 weeks and then rains a little bit. Should be interesting... and sweaty.
  Well I am not sunburned yet, but I am a little darker. I don´t think i need to worry about getting burned much now but I will still wear sunblock.
  According to Brazil Belém mission rules, we cannot wear sunglasses. Maybe if it starts bothering me and becomes a problem I can talk to the mish prez about it.
  Largest meal of the day is lunch, yes, which is why we go to the members houses everyday for lunch.
  I have cereal, toast, and homemade cheese pizza for breakfast and dinner. I will get my companion to teach me how to make some eggs and easy to cook chicken though, so don´t worry.
  I don´t think I had to leave anything at the MTC, no problems there. I think the luggage weight restriction comes into play when transferred to one of the smaller zones, so I am good for now.
I will send pictures home next week, I think I figured out how. I don´t have a lot of time right now to do it, sorry! :/
We have a washing machine but no dryer. We can only hang them up to dry. I ironed for the first time though! pretty neat...
There are a bunch of cyber cafe´s around the area. Anyways I need to go. I love you all and miss you all a bunch. And I´m praying for you all. Have a good week.

Week Ten - Finally in Belem!

 Wow!  I can't tell you how long it seemed since we got his last e-mail!  Talk about time dragging!  We got a wonderful surprise this morning and finally got Tom's first e-mail from Belem.  It sounds like he likes it there and likes his companion, which is a huge relief!  And, he's still eating beans - such a funny kid!  We are so proud of him and all of the new things he is being brave about trying and doing.  This is going to be a great adventure!

Hello Everyone!
     I hope everyone is still doing good, staying safe, not having any problems, and not missing me too much! Monday is P-day out here in the field so that is when you should start expecting e-mails now. Since I wasn´t able to e-mail last week I have a lot to say, so I hope I can remember it all.
     In the last week of the MTC we had an Elder, from Provo, join us, Elder Funk, and he was really cool. He instantly got a long with everyone and he is just a really nice guy with a very strong testimony. All the Brazilians laugh at his name because Funk, in Brazil, is a not so good type of music that is kinda inappropriate, and they told him if he was going to Rio de Janeiro, which he is not, he would receive a lot of attention. Pretty funny what a name can do. The night before my district and I left for the mission field was special. We all said good bye, one last time, and a lot of uplifting thoughts about each other were shared. I am kinda missing my district out here in the field. They were all such cool people, and I felt like I already knew all of them within the first 5 minutes of meeting them.
     Anyways, the flight to Belém was okay. We got up at 4 in the morning, left for the airport at 4:45, and were on our way at about 7. We first flew to Brasilia, which looked really cool. You could see lots of trees out in the distance and a bunch of high rises popping out of them in all directions. We then left for Belém at about 10 or so and arrived somewhere between 12 and 1 I think. I didn´t get a window seat on either flight, but thats okay because I think it was cloudy the whole way there so you couldn´t see anything anyways.
     Belém is pretty cool though. I think I like it a little more than São Paulo. It is nice to finally be out of the MTC. When we arrived, we first went to the Mission President´s home, which is the 18th floor of a super nice hotel. You could see all of belém and the jungle across the river from there. We had lunch there, which was... okay. I tried some lasagna(?), but I didn´t like it much. The ice cream was good though. After lunch, we went to the church office of Belém, had our interview with the president, and learned where in the state of Pará we would serve. My MTC companion, Elder Fox, and one of my roommates, Elder De la Cruz, are serving in cities about 10 hours up the river, so the get to take a nice long boat ride. Another, Elder Hoch, is serving in Macapá, which is even closer to the equator than Belém. Elder Kaufman is serving in the outskirts of Belém, called Helama, I think, where they have two main, cement roads, and the rest are dirt. And Elder Shaw and I are serving within the city of Belém.
     After we found out where we are serving, we met our new companions, Elder Reis, who is really cool and very helpful. We went back to the President´s place, had a small presentation, some really good cake, and left for our apartments. Ours is tiny. It is the second floor of an old lady´s house. You go up some steep stairs to the first room, our study room, with a super thin hall, that only one person can fit through at a time, going straight back, with 3 small rooms on the right and a teeny tiny kitchen at the end. The place is small, but its nice and I kinda like it.
     Belém has a number of high rises in the center but I think I am serving on the south end of the city, close to the river, and it is mostly just small, kinda run down houses. The people here are nice and willing to talk. We have lunch at member´s houses and it is usually pretty good, they have stuff I can eat. I am trying to eat a lot more stuff now. I don´t like all of it, especially the beans, but I am eating it.
    I did receive the letters from you guys and the valentine´s day package. Thank you very much for those, I really enjoyed the letters and the candy! :) I did not receive anything from Grandma and Grandpa Pratt through Mr. Cheyney´s, sorry :(, so yeah, see if they can send it to the mission home here.
    Glad to hear David is doing better and thats awesome that he got to meet Thurl. He´s soooo tall!! And its also awesome that you guys only had one loss in church ball this season! good job guys! I don´t think I know who David´s friend is, that just left for his mission, but where he is going sounds really cool.
    Thanks for the news. Sad to hear about Whitney Houston. Cool to hear that Dad sold the van and burb. I hope you made some good money off of it. It´s also kinda sad too, though. I´m going to miss takin´ the burb to St. George. Thanks for offering to send more stuff. I think I can find all that I need down here, so don´t worry about sending stuff from home. Thanks for the tip on the powder stuffs. I haven´t even started using the stuff I have yet but I will remember what you said. Also some other good news: I now have an hour to e-mail instead of a half hour!! Isn´t that just great? And pictures... I can´t go to any site on the web other than myldsmail, so I don´t think I can send them through the Costco thing, but I will ask my companion what he does to send pictures home and try to get them to you next week.
    I love you all and miss you a lot!!! I can´t wait to e-mail you guys again! I am praying for all of you! Have a great week everyone! TCHAU!!
                                  Love Elder Williams

Prom 2012

Cottonwood's Junior Prom was Saturday, February 18th at the State Capitol.  David went with Sierra Woolston and had a really good time.  Since they always make a full day of it, they started out by driving clear up to Soldier Summit to go tubing - David said it wasn't worth the long drive, but they had fun.  Then they went to dinner at Market Street Broiler, which he said was really good and reminded him of being on a ship.  They went to the dance and then went bowling after that.  It's his last big, formal dance before he graduates, so I was really glad he went.  He went with his good friends Landon and Andrew and a few others from that crowd and really had a lot of fun.  Good times!

Week Eight - Let Loose On the Streets of Sao Paulo!

I am getting nervous that Tom is going to be leaving the safety of the MTC and heading out to the real world.  I kind of had a tough week, really missing him a lot, but at the same time, we are excited for him to move on to some new adventures. 

Bom Dia Familia e Amigos!

      This past week went up and down a lot. We got a new instructor because our afternoon one, Irmão Maurício, left for a vacation. Trying to teach the new one was really frustrating, because she acts as an athiest when we teach her and we are just kind of clueless as to how to approach the lessons... Anyways, yesterday was our first day of proselyting and it went okay.  My companion gave out one Book of Mormon but we didn´t have any luck after that. Within 5 minutes of walking out the MTC my companion talked to a kid, probably about 18 or 19 years old, and asked him if he wanted the Book of Mormon and would read it. He accepted but there were a lot of moments of awkward silence because my companion couldn´t think of what to say. But at least we got him to accept the Book of Mormon. The next guy he tried talking to was standing next to his car and instantly said he had to go to work. And the last guy, my companion asked how he was. He said he was okay but it was very hot out and he was sweating pretty bad. My companion couldn´t think of anything to say so I tried talking to him and he had a lot to say... and I didn´t understand any of it. I could only understand him because of the hand motions he made while talking... The language is going to be the biggest stumbling block for the longest time and I´m not really looking forward to it. Anyways, I asked him if he talked to the missionaries before and if he had a book of mormon, he said yes then said he had to go, end of story. We go proselyting on monday again but we get to go down town, and I heard its a lot easier because more people are willing to listen and will accept a Book of Mormon, while outside the MTC, people have been asked to read one every week since the MTC was built.

     The district had a pretty cool experience on Friday night. Our instructor was unable to teach us that night so we were just told to study "the role of the holy ghost in conversion" and share what we learned with eachother and we also all shared personal experiences, and it was a very cool and spiritual experience. I told them how I was struggling after the second week and did not feel qualified to be teaching people, and my confidence was really low, but I prayed about it and within the week I received letters from you guys and from G&G Williams, and they all had some very encouraging things written in them and made me feel about 100 times better... So muito muito obrigado for the letters!

     I had a cinnamon roll today from Mr. Cheyney´s and some french fries last week from some other place, and they were sooo good....yeah. Anyways, I´m kinda glad to be leaving the MTC now. São Paulo was cool and all but its not my kind of city. I just kinda feel bad for the missionaries who spend 10 weeks in the MTC and then take a 20 minute bus ride to serve in São Paulo south. I´m sure they don´t mind but I´m glad I am going somewhere else.

 I´m glad you had the missionaries over! Invite them again soon so they can share more messages with you!  I´m sorry to hear about basketball David, but it sounds like you can still play baseball, sort of, and I hope it doesn´t become a big problem for you! Good luck on the baseball team this season! EM! You should go hunting on the runways again! that sounds like fun! but next time use the shot gun and shoot at the ground or something, if nothing else. :)

 

 I would talk more about the elders in my district but I am really low on time, so if I get a chance next week, hopefully I won´t have much of a time limit, and I will talk about them, because they are all really good friends and I feel like I already knew all of them when I first met them, or they remind me of someone I know.

I am eating some beans. I put a little on the rice almost everytime, as long as I am feeling up to it. I don´t like it much but as long as I have a lot of rice and a little bit of beans, I can manage.

I am not sure if I can have an I-pod in the field. Maybe my mission president will allow it but I will have to find out later.

In the mornings we study for about 2 and a half ours, then we have gym and after that we use the computers to practice portuguese, but I just watch mormon messages or the "I´m a mormon" videos.

6 missionaries in my district going to Belém with me. Not sure about the other district I arrived to the MTC with though.

I am not sure about how much my bag weighs right now... I am going to have to pack a lot of stuff in the shoulder bag I have. I am hoping I will be under though... hoping.. Anyways, I was going to ask if you could update me a little bit on the news, maybe some national and international stuff. I heard Kim Jong il or whatever his name is died... I also heard Romney is in the lead for the presidential race. And I heard what happened about the Susan Powell story which is very sad. Hopefully if you share some news it will be better.

                      I think the scripture I will choose that Gary Hatch can use on the plaque or whatever is Alma 29:9... I think thats the one. I read it a couple of days ago and really liked it so I will use that one. Anyways I need to go now, but I feel like there  is something else I need to say... I will try to remember it next time. I will talk to you all again when I am in the field!!!! OOOOH that is exciting! :) Tchau everybody, I love you and miss you and can´t wait to email home again.

                                                    Love Elder Williams