Companion: Elder Braga
Alright so Last monday i just packed in the afternoon to get ready to leave, because i was leaving for Campo Maior at 8 30 am.
Tuesday we were waiting for our ride to come, and he didn come. We didnt have credit on our phone so we couldnt call to remind him! I was for sure going to be late, but then another member called and we asked him to call this other member to come pick us up. It was honestly a miracle. I was pulling in a little late but the bus was just about ready to go and i threw all my stuff on and took off. I was all kind of in a rush, but that bus ride was seriously heaven. Imagine one of those nice, big traveling busses for seriously like 7 people. I could choose any row, the air conditioning was on and it was A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. I was a little hungry, but it stops in like 3 cities before i arrived. A person came on selling corn, and so i bought one, which was like 1 real and 50 cents. It tasted so good. He sprays this salt/butter juice on it and man it was sooooo good. It reminded me of Nacho Libre.. kinda... not really. Anyway it was like 4 hours of traveling in heaven. I slept for about an hour and a half, and played with the rubix cube my comp gave me for christmas and just relaxed.. and yes i traveled alone. So i got there and sat on the bench at the bus station when a member came over and started talkin to me. I sat there talking to him for about an hour while the Elders were at lunch. (There are 4 Elders in Campo Maior and only one branch, but it is pretty close to Teresina, and yes Teresina is hotter) So the other Elders finally showed up, and before i came here, i heard a little about my new comp, Elder Braga. He is part Japonese, so he looks japonese and speaks really good english. Anyway, he traded tags with a member to make me think it was the other guy! It was so funny. The other guy is a member and he did a split with us all day, with Elder Bragas tag. I really didnt know much about my comp, so i did have doubts for a while and i thought it was the member, but i kind of knew all along. And later that night they finally traded. Anyway after i dropped my stuff at the house we went to visit people and what not. This place is cool. Its more of the trails and stuff and its more of a jungle area. Not that its like the jungle, but its more of the trails and dirt roads and trees and rivers and stuff like i expected before the mission.
Wednesday we visited lots of people again and even in the morning we played a little basketball right next to that lake that dad had a picture of the area. Anyway pretty basic day.
Thursday we talked to some of the same people, and its cool here. I feel like our investigators are really progressing and we will get some baptisms this time through. The people are really cool here and i love it. My favorite part is that there is no drama in the house. I felt so bad for elder Robertson when i left, he was pretty disappointed. But everyone here acts like men and we take care of business and i love it. I really didnt realize how ridiculous it was back there until i was here. I am loving it here. And that night we went to a lakeside restaurant to eat pizza. They threw in some food in the lake, and guess what? There are piranna here! Its pretty cool. I think we might go fish them some p day in the future. And there was an aligator! I sent a pic, but it was really dark. He isnt super big like the one dad saw in New Orleans, but he was about 4-5 ft long.
Friday was an interesting new years eve. Everyone was partying and it reminded me of good ole parties at home... just a lot less drinking at home haha. But the people are cool here and i went to bed early, but set my clock to see the last few minutes of the year. I woke up anyways with all the fireworks going off. People shoot fireworks regularly here, but there was a lot going off. So it wasnt super exciting but it was cool.
Saturday was a tough day to teach. Everyone was all hungover from the day before, or just sleeping because they partyed all night. So we really didnt have much until about 4 o clock in the afternoon because everyone was sleeping or gone. Anyway the other Elders had 2 baptisms at 5 so we went to see that. It is nice to see that people are actually getting baptized here. They have, and i think we have too, a few baptisms lined up every week. I hope we can get one this week, but the next week is looking good for sure.
Sunday we went to church, as usual, and its a cool church. Yes its technically a house church, but i love it, and probably more then the chapel i had in Parnaiba. Its really cool and i love the members here. Anyway all of the elders, we bore our testimonies and it was cool. I felt so blessed that when i feel the spirit, i can speak so clear and get out what i want to say. It really is gifts of the spirit, and i felt it a little bit when bearing my testimony. Lots of people came up after and basically said, oh you sound brazilian. But it really isnt me doing it, because i have had other times where i hardly spoke at all, and i realize that it was a blessing of the lord. So realize the lords hand in everything, i see that he likes to give more blessings if you do that.
Today, i wish i took a pic, but we went way out to the end of the area and played soccer with a bunch of brazilians. It was so cool! It was this random field in the middle of a big pasture type field it looked like, and it was fun. The brazilians liked to pick on the one american out there haha it was sweet. I might buy some soccer shoes if we keep playin because in tennis shoes was kinda hard to play in. But it was awesome. The other elders in the house are Elder Almeida(Strong soccer player and District Leader) and Elder Magalhães (tall white brasilian that likes basketball). Anyway it is pretty sweet.
So just some funny random stuff. First is that if you want to have a barbeque, you dont just go to wal mart to buy the meat. you have two options. First there is places with huge slabs of the ribs of cow, kind of like we used to have at grandpa drapers, but grosser looking. Or, and i kind of saw this once, you kill the pig in the backyard. we were walkin down this dirt road and all of a sudden i look over and this pig is just screamin and this guy is standin above the pig, but there was a screen thing so i couldnt see exactly, but it was obvious what was going on. Anyway its pretty crazy. And i found this stuff kind of like Cream of Wheat and i love it so much. They made it in the CTM and finally i found something close and even a little better.
As you found out, my comp is have Japenese and is literally a Genius (given because he is asian) I guess he owns a business that him and his friend started and its basically selling areosale cans. (dont know how to spell that) His parents are chemists or something so they make what goes inside, but he started working on this and other things when he was like 12. Its pretty impressive!
Anyway i forgot your questions so i will send this real fast and get to your questions. The house here is a lot smaller then what i had, but its all good because i like this place a lot.
Peace and love from Campo Maior,
Elder Smoot
Elder Robertson wrote this as Elder Tanner Smoot left Parnaiba:
ReplyDeleteWell, transfers came and left and Elder Melo and me are still here in Parnaíba. The only change that came here in Parnaíba is that Elder Smoot left and Elder Cameron came. I miss Elder Smoot quite a bit. He was a great missionary and we did have a pretty good friendship. We would both come home at the end of the day and just talk about all our problems haha. It was good to have him around ha. But Elder Cameron is a good guy too. He is from Las Vegas and is way goofy haha. I like him. We get a long great.