Wk 75 - What a week

--leaving parnaiba

--elder pires,,, elder olson

--we got to lay in a coffin.... weird.. but kinda fun. gotta love elder Stewart!

--again.. just they put the top on the coffin.. it was very hot. and
look at that fat! wahoo

--a cool car that was parked at the apartment building

--me and stewart

--the new guys and the bolivian

--our room

--me and elder lima

Area: Teresina Horto 2
Companion: Elder Lima

Well it was quite the week here in teresina... its basically this. Me

and my comp (Elder Lima) we are really pumped and workin hard... i
dont think ive been this pumped on the mission yet and man im sleeping
really good at night. We taught A LOt of lessons this week and it has
been good. Elder Lima came from Caxias, Maranhão that was opened when
he started the mission... so he was really used to doing lots of
contacts and teaching a lot. he has 5 months on the mission, he is
from São Paulo, São Paulo, and we get along well.... We are workin
hard, now we just gotta turn all of these lessons into baptisms...
thats pretty much what we are expected to do.

As you heard last week, on tuesday we had to get up early to catch a
bus... i didnt get to bed till like 2 am (i was packing and cleaning
the house) and i had to get up at 4 to get ready to go... We had a
good member drop us off at the bus station and we were on our way at
5. As soon as the bus took off i felt really sick and had to use the
restroom... but we all know that it is bad manners to use the bus
restroom...anyway, it was a tough bus ride, but we made it alright. We
got to Teresina about noonish.. then went to the STAFF... that is the
main house where the new missionaries stay, people leaving the mission
stay, and pretty much anyone that comes through teresina for a little
will stay at the Staff house... its an apartement on the 6th floor...
Other than all the people that were there, its pretty nice! very cool
at night and has a little balcony area where i like to write in my
journal every morning. i actually went to Elder Stewart´s old area! So
he was there and was going to stay until the next day so i spent the
day with him... getting to know the area. That night we had Elder
Robertson there waiting for his new comp until midnight... man i was
soooo tired.

Wednesday... 1 year and 5 months complete... me and elder lima were
now on our own.. we spent the day feeling very lost and what not, but
we taught a bunch of lessons and made some contancts.... slept really
good that night.

Thursday me and elder lima were gonna go work... but the leaders had a
training so we had all the brand new missionaries with us... we had to
get a member to make lunch for them and i took 2 new americans with me
(Elder Christensen and Elder King) and my comp took one new brasilian
and another Elder (Elder Mamani from Bolivia). So we taught until
about 4 ish and then brought them back. We spent the day making
contacts and teaching some people we met with elder stewart and his
comp elder camargo and seeing some contacts that we made.

Friday we were still pretty confused, but getting the hang of it... we
still were just workin hard, teaching a lot, making new contacts. We
taught this cool recent convert family (the 3 daughters are new
members but the parents didnt baptize yet) and they gave us a ride
home. I am enjoying the area and the members are pretty cool. Me and
my comp are studying chapter 6 of PMG and im reading the book of
mormon in portuguese... i realized i was reading it a while back but
now im really reading a lot and im in mosiah ch. 20ish,.... but its
good. im really enjoying it in portuguese.

Saturday was tough... most of our appointments fell through and the
streets were empty. every weekend its kinda like this. everyone leaves
to drink and listen to music. but we did talk to marcos, who is a
friend of a new member named joão. they have 12 years old and like the
church a lot.. hopefully we can baptize marcos next sunday.... he will
if his grandma lets him. We talked to some police guys that were on
surveilance at night.. so they werent drunk haha. we got home, my comp
cut my hair, i cut his hair, shower, bed. ive been sleeping a lot
better lately.

Sunday was a little different. here the ward is from 4pm to 7. so we
had the morning to study and try to visit some people... we had an
investigator we wanted to baptize next week that we caught drinking
with a bunch of men in the front of her house... i was pretty bummed.
but we had a good lunch at a members house, we went to the church and
marcos came with joao and we had one other young man with 12 years
come and 2 girls that were about 18 yrs old come as well that werent
members. The girls are a sister and friend of a really strong recent
convert named domingos... we taught them after church and they are
super solid.. the problem is that they live in miguel alves which is
about 2 hours from teresina... but if they stay long enough i think we
can still baptize them... we then went and left a message with another
investigator with that same family with the sisters that all baptized
and the parents arent... they gave us a ride home after the visit.

I am loving the area... sorry if its really confusing.. im pretty
confused still too! have a great week and ill do the same.

love ya!

Elder Smoot