Hyrum from Cuiaba to Manaus to Home!

LAST Email... Bittersweet!

2010-07-17T16:53:00.000-07:00

well lets see, to work extra hard this last week will be hard casue i only have 2 dsays left to work, tonight the ward is dong a farewell party for me, then i will do a division in the ward rio branco to say bye to ppl fromt here, then friday ill say bye to ppl here and sat airplane to manaus, sunday grande circular to say bye to ppl there and then mon morning intervista, afternoon free time, night dinner at pres, tues morning airplane home.
crazy crazy. haha. so last night was the coolest thing ever, a perfect way to finish my mission. i did a division in the ward aquiry that i passed in last year and a family i taught last year i visited and some of the members had been baptized after i left but not all.
well long story short i got to baptize a girl from the family that i taught last year, it was amazingly awesome.
so FYI i will land at 12:28 in the airport ok!!! and do you know if beau will be there? and a ? for you, would it be ok if i hugged jatauna in the airport? im like a little boy all nervous haha. its weird cause i've avoided girls for two years and now to think about it im like freaking myself out haha. but ya, just some mom's advice would help:)
i will put out my hamock and sleep ahhhhh when i get home! not sure about air conditioners! g2g love ya! see ya soon

Eating Monkey?

2010-06-11T07:42:00.000-07:00

Well this week was way way busy. lets see....
on thursday we received a phone call from the assistants telling us that an area would open here in our zone and that it would be for sisters so we needed to find a safe house for them to live and needed to get to know members and etc.. in their area. so that is about all we did since last week. we found a house and had to do the contract of it and had to put furniture in their house and go to stores to see who would give us the best price on other appliances that they needed and so on. it was a way busy week.
its been hard to keep up in our area haha. but finally transfers finished and the sistes are here and looks like all is well. haha. um i ended up staying with my comp here so he will kill me and i will finish my mission in acre. im happy cause i wanted to finish here.
there is a member in the area rio branco. that is making lots of candy with local fruits and stuff, she said i have to take it home for you to eat haha. she is soo cool. she is making lots of stuff for me to take home for you to eat and experiment haha. she is sooo cool. when we come back i will take you to her house. she wants to meet you.
speaking of this, when are we going to come back? do you have an idea yet? so this week we had a FHE and the message was cool. we were talking about how the homecoming would be when we go back to heaven. and how we would be so happy that we made it and that we did the right choices here on earth and stuff. and then i was thinking how excited i am for the encounter with my family next month and how its only been for two years. it will be an amazing thing to re encounter with God of this life.
also another thing, this week i ate something way crazy cool. haha. it was like weird.....it was a monkey. it was weird to think i was eating a little monkey haha. but ya, im still alive so no worries.
Oh could you tell Amanda and Grandma happy Bday for me. well ya this was pretty much my week. Love you
Elder Stanger

boy oh boy, do I love acre!

2010-05-19T08:07:00.000-07:00

how goes it? any news on the baby?
well this week was cool and passed super fast again haha. when we were in porto velho we saw a new ferrari. it was way nice haha. i was like there is no way im in porto velho and seeing this. the translation of porto velho in english is, old door. i was amazed to see that car haha.
about the trip! my comp ended up taking a 8 hour bus ride to porto velho cause another elder in the zone didn't have a ticket for the plane cause the secretary forgot to buy it cause he was new haha. so ya, my comp ended up getting bus with him. we had the conf and all, it was good, but on the way back they had forgotten to buy my comps plane ticket so he had to get bus on the way back also. poor kid!
but ya, um sunday we had a baptism. it was way good. her name is daniela. she has such a strong testimony. like she goes around telling everyone that the church is true. one of her neighbors was talking to her about her baptism and she was saying how amazing it was then the neighbor was like o ya i will be baptised in my chruch this week also. and she was like really, that is sad casue you will just go swimming cause your chruch doesnt have authority. i was like oh no. it is funny.
its her mom who is "in love" with me. so sunday was totally weird cause she just sat at chruch allllll day crying cause she can't have me. but then monday we talked to her and she understands now. she said she is always dreaming with me but she knows it is satan putting the thoughts in her mind cause she knows she cant have me. im always talking about how i have a girlfreind and how she is waiting for me. like in the movie "the other side of heaven" the girl totally offers herself to the elder and he explains how he has someone waiting for him, we had her watch the movie and i kinda pulled the same lines.
but we marked her baptism for sunday now and she wants me to baptise her. this could be weird. but ya, we are also teaching a cool fam that was referals from daniela and her mom and we marked their date for the 6th of june. their names are antonio, francisca, and bahiano.
this sunday will be stake conf so im excited to see members from the other wards i worked in last year. i got to go to the ward rio branco and do baptismal interviews for them and while i was there the ward was doing an activity so we went, it was sooo cool to see ppl i taught, families and etc.. that were and are still active at the activity. it was fun!!! i talked to the members and my RC and everything. it was sweet.
boy o boy do i love acre! i love it. i will really miss it after the mission.
last night we did a FHE and we asked the members to talk about how they met the elders and if they could say something to the elder that taught them now what would it be. and wow, it touched me to think how much we can touch the lives of ppl. i thought back to the ppl that i taught and thought how much i mean to them. because of me they were able to receive the key to the celestial door. it was humbling to see how little i recognize the Lord using me to bring salvation unto his children. im like his biggest tool in fulfilling his work and glory. well i love you family. i hope all is well. i only have 8 more pdays after this one. weird huh. well love you.

2010-05-13T08:06:00.000-07:00

well first off, this week was good. we got to talk on sunday which was wonderful. :) um, we have co0l investigators that we are teaching and one will be baptised on sunday.
today for pday we visited some museums here in rio branco, we visited a museum of rubber, this place was like a HUGE distributor a few yearsago.
tomorrow we will be getting a flight to porto velho for a conf with a 70. we will get back on sat to do all the baptism interviews for sunday. it will be a pretty busy next few days.
the lady that will be baptised on sunday is daniela. she is soo cool. her mom is starting to like the lessons and stuff also. she wants to get married and she wants a guy from a diff place and how he needs to be "of God". something i realized is that i have 10 weeks left from yesterday. yup, its on two hands now. crazy crazy

Pics!

2010-04-23T12:14:00.001-07:00

BBQ Big Hill

Chastity Dream! Cool Bridge

Wierd! Happy :-)

hmmmm Member's Yard

Service Project!

SunSet Star Fruit

Preparing for Elder Holland Smashed!

Sleep Floating!

Elder Holland!

2010-04-23T12:06:00.000-07:00

we just got done with a conf with elder holland. it was soo amazing, mother. he talked about how our callings as missionanries are the same as his calling as an apostle to teach and testify of the restaratino of the gospel he was he is and Apostle with a An and we are apostles with an E haha. it was funny. he talked about how important our missions are in the lives of ppl and how we are participating in the lord work and glory (moses 1:39) and how in his words "we (as the curch) are trusting the lords largest work in your hands" he was funny also saying how the lord is saving the world with us 19 yr olds and how no other program would do that in the world. he was like get a 19yr old from rigby idaho send him to manaus to save the world when he wasn't even able to save rigby haha. it was funny. he bore very strong testimony and of course i got to shake his hand.
there was also a presiding bishopric with him and elder godoy of the 70. it was awesome. elder holland asked me where i was from and i said idaho and he was like ya, what city i told him and he was like there are lots of ppl here from idaho and bishop edgley (spelling?) was like hey im from idaho. so i asked what city and he said preston, i was like o im from twin and he said the second best little city in idaho alem preston haha. it was fun. also come to find out elder holland is a family friend of orr so were all walking through shakin his hand and all and orr gets there and he pulls a sack out with a camera and letters and was like hey your mom wanted me to give you this and say happy bday and also she said to give you this and then he gave him a hug. i was like wow haha. it was cool. i love elder holland he is my fav apostle. like his talks are soo powerful and spiritual. like i was just in love with the talks haha. there was like a funny/sad part cause there were a couple of misionaries messing around when he was talking about the importance of obedience and how everything we do deals with obedence and how the first thing we do in the temple is promise to obey and so on but these elders were whispering and he totally called them out. and said stay with me elders. at the end he apoligized for doing it and being so bold with us. he was pretty strong speaking. it was awesome. he talked about lots of cool stuff. it was just amazing. i just wish you could have been there cause i cant really talk about how amazing it was!!! other stuff this week was something cool in alma i was studing. and in alma 9 15-17 and 30 i really enjoyed. like how the ppl are brazilians and how were brothers and for this we need to love them. like its soo cool. ya also on the sadder side of things, a person we taught for the first time the other day we marked to go back and come to find out she didnt like it to much and burnt the bom. oooopsi for her haha. also i renewed my visa finaly it was expired for about 7 months haha. :S all is good now though finally. um ya it was a good week. the best was elder holland. like it was truly amazing. o we also got the whole fam of iace to go to chruch. the lady who is sick. she is doing good. i pray she continues. um i will find out about transfers sat and so next week it will all be decided.

Testimony Strenghtened

2010-04-07T11:32:00.000-07:00

i loved Elder Holland's talk along with lots of other talks. it was all for parenting and stuff almost. it was amazing. haha. so this week was cool i guess. we are preparing a lady for baptism. well 2 but one is an amazing story. her name is Fatima. she is the grandma of a recent convert. she is old haha. but i love her and because of her i was able to have such a spirital experience and gain a way stronger testimony. we have been teaching her and she said she prayed and wanted to be baptised. so one of the lesssons we decided ot mark during the interval of the conferences. so we went and started teaching her and she said she wanted to tell us an experience she had. but before all this happened i was watching conf and had the biggest feeling to ask her if her husbands temple work had been done. but then i was like, weird. cause i hadnt even known her husband had died. then we started teacing and she was like can i tell you a story of my answer? and we said of course. she started of saying how her husband had died 4 years ago and how she has never dreamed with him since then and the night she prayed about the BOM she couldnt sleep cause every time she would go to sleep her husband would visit her and he was so happy that she was being tought. so that is why she decided to be baptised. i was like wow, he has passed away so i go to ask if his temple work was done and i didnt even get the ? out. i said has her husband and her grandaughter replied yes we have already done his temple work. then we finished teaching and we talked her in to doing the prayer. she is old and simple and didnt know how to pray so her grandaughter helped her. during the prayer i literaly felt the love of the Lord so strongley to see how simple she was but how amazing of an answer she recived and how the Lord loves us soo much. His atonment is for all of us. im soo thankful for that. i know he loves me. i could feel it and i dont have a doubt in my mind or heart about it now. a simple act of her praying about a book will help her to have an eternal family now. and all this amazing love of God for a person so simple. she doesnt have a car or a nice house or nothing but she is amazing.
i am soo excited for elder holland to come to visit us. we are trying way hard to find familys of investigators as of less active to take.
o so this last two days me and orr did divisions. it was sooo fun to spend so much time with him. way trunky haha. just talking about good old memories and palns for after the mish haha. we will do some fun stuf. haha. it is gong pretty well though. could you tell alexa happy bday for me. she is 6 now right? so very big haha.
today we played bball for like 4 hours almost in the rain. haha. its raining soo much here latly haha. i guess we are in the rain forest during the rainy season haha.
the other night i was sleeping and i had fallen asleep on my stomach and i woke up to something crawling on my back...i wont tell you the rest of the story though hahha. well i love you mom. the chruch is true. aha.

Hard week at home :-(

2010-04-07T11:07:00.000-07:00

wow. i think the only good news might be that ginger is in a peacful rest now hahaa. that is sad about kip and lejeen.how are they doing now?
as for me and my week, well. i am totally dying of excitement for conference this weekend!!! it will be an amazing conf as always and to add my last one in the mission so i will have to make the best of it. also you remember those pics of the old crazy guy i sent home wiht the big cup thingy. well we went to the house and he was painting so i grabbed the paint brush and played war with him so he was all like dancing trying to get away from the paint brush and it was the funniest thing ever watching him dance. he looked like a monkey almost. like his hands in the air and everything. then i juut pushed the brush to the frente and got him and he was like oh, well ok no problem its paint. now im blue and he started like rubbing the paint all over him and was like ill shower later haha. it was funny. we have an investigator whos name is Iace. she wsa a reference from a member and she has a sad story. like 6 yrs ago she was diagnosed with a disease, she said it was called "neroismo" (not sure abotu spelling) well the doctor told her she had 6 months to live. and this ws 6 yeras ago. so now she is just holding on everyday not knowing when she will die. she crys a ton and tells us how she feels bad for her family and she doesn't want to leave her kids. she must be around 45 yrs old. she like just bleeds out of her mouth, ears, and nose randomly and some days her legs go paralized and she cant walk and etc.... its sad. we are focusing on the plan of salvation and eternal families. i hope she can recognize the anwser of God and follow it. she really is an amazing person. also have another lady who lives with some of our other RC. her name is Lene. she is marked to be baptized this sat after conf but she traveled and hasn't returned yet so i dont know how it will work out with her. i am really hoping that she comes back very soon.!!! could you tell melissa happy bday for me. but other then that all is going good here. the mission is fun and ya, im trying to better my relationship with my salvador by studing lots about him so that i dont get to trunky toward the end of my mission. i figure if i know him better i will appreciate more the time i have to represent him and not get trunky ahaha. so ya, im trying to get to know him better so i can appreciate my last months in the field. well i hope you have a better week this week and that all is well there. love ya.

A Great Week for Sure!

2010-03-30T07:28:00.000-07:00

real feijoada! its got like the garbage of pork meat . brazilian gold haha.
so this week was well AWESOME!!!!! you have no idea. well johnson and I stayed together in the area again but, guess who got transfered into my district.....ELDER ORR. can you believe it? he is my ZL and their in my district. it was sooo awesome. today we actually passed the morning together playin bball and 'settlers of zarahemla' haha. it was cool then it was rainin when johnson and i were coming back to our house and i totally slipped. johnson always slips and i always laugh at him so you can only imagine he had a good laugh at me also. ooopsi!
o so i was looking through elder orrs photos and i saw a pic of me with his family pinning a mustache on me. he always talked about me and his family always does a game for christmas to be able to open pics so last year it was "pin the stache on stanger" like pin the tail on the donkey. i totally got the pic from him. it was funny, kinda embarrassing to think his fam had to pin a stache on me to open a present haha. :S. i love that kid.
so guess who is visiting our mission the end of april!!!! Elder Holland!!! ya im so excited. he is like my fav apostolo!!! it will be an awesome experience!!!
what is the law on monkey skin? like lets just say i had a scripture case made out of monkey would i have a hard time getting it to the states? cause i totally talked to that hippie and asked what he could do and he said at the moment he had monkey, snake and crocodile and so ya, as of yesterday i have a moneky scripture cover. its pretty cool though. i mean it will be awesome in the states. haha. Oh guess what else happend this week. so i did division with elders in the district and at night we were at our house and the my comp and the other elder (elder a. smith) come in and their pulling a little suitcase. i just saw it and thought that looks like my bag. then thought more about it and was like, why do they have a suitcase. then i was like, that is my bag!!!! haha. the office elders had "misplaced it" in the chapel. so they found it and i have my journal and everything else now!!! wow good week i tell you what haha. i get my journal back and elder orr in my district the same week and a monkey scripture case. wooo hooo.
sadly elder T. Davis went home yesterday has he finished his mission. i also found out that elder johnosn great great grandpa is James E. Talmage, you know the guy who wrote Jesus the Christ and tons of other amazing books. haha. cool huh? well ya that is about my week!!! good week for sure!!!

Week in Review! From both Comps!

2010-03-11T07:54:00.000-08:00

From his COMP (great email! pay special notice to the bold paragraphs)
Oi família,

Well this week certainly passed fast, it seems like just yesterday I was writing my last e-mail. Once again it has been an eventful week, although certainly less embarassing than the last one. It would have been pretty tough to be MORE embarrassing certainly, but that's okay, I'm getting past it and learning from my experiences! The highlight of the week had to be the two baptisms that happened on Sunday night. Our investigators Junior and Luis were both baptized, which was a relief because for a second it looked like we had some problems. Luis (the peruvian) lives really far from the chapel and he works a lot during the day, so we had just set it up so that he'd get his interview right before the baptism. We even went over the questions with him before hand so that we would know if any problems would come up. We did the same for Junior too. Sure it was risky to have the interviews right before the baptism, but we went over the questions beforehand and they both said that there weren't any problems there. Well after some confusion in getting there (Elder Stanger had to do an interview right before so we had to do some scrambling to get both investigators there) it turns out that both Junior and Luis had problems with the serious question and had to talk to President before they were baptized. It definitely came as a shock and was really unfortunate because their families had already started coming for the baptisms and all that. So we scheduled the interviews with the President the next day (he was already going to be at the chapel for another stake's stake conference). Everything ended up turning out okay, they both were able to be baptized after church on Sunday night. It was a little hectic and a little stressful but everything worked out. Sunday actually ended up being a very interesting day. The other stake had a stake conference, so our ward didnt start until 3! That meant we actually got to get up and do exercises and actually do our studies, which we never have time for on Sundays. Then we had to go to the chapel early for the interviews and then we had church and then the baptisms and then the day was over, it was a very, well it involved a lot less walking than normal. It was a pretty relaxing Sunday!

Oh So then last Pday after e-mails we took a bus down to the center (which as always, was an adventure in itself) and we met Elder T. Davis (the ex-comp of Elder Stanger who's going home soon) and Elder Johnson (elder Carlings first companion in the field). We then went to lunch at a member's house. It was actually a member that Elder T. Davis baptized his first time through in that area, so it was really cool to see a member that was baptized, stay strong in the church for a long time and still have a really strong love for all missionaries. So then after that we went to the Elder's apartment and played a lot of Settler's of Zarahemla, which is Settlers of Cataan with a mormon twist. Elder Stanger said that since a lot of the cards have scritptures included we're going to start playing it for companionship study...haha just kidding. I've got entirely too much work to do to study the lessons and the language before I can even begin to think about doing something like that. So it was a really fun trip though, I was, once again, by far the youngest in the group, which is alwasy tough. Everyone starts telling stories and all the sudden I feel like I never will go home, but that night we got back to work and it was all good.

So I hope everyone remembers me talking about Samuel and Ana, the parents of the family we baptized. We had been planning on getting all their papers togetherfor baptisms, and we were just waiting for the money, when we heard than Samuel and given in and got drunk one night. Well that didn't fly to well for Ana (who has been living with him for 17 years) and we heard from her kids that she wanted the papers back and all of that. Unfortunately the next time she was free I was on a Division in our area with an Elder Oxborrow, so because I know the family I had to do a lot of talking. We gathered the family together, and Ana began talking about her struggles with living with him, and about how she just wanted the best for her kids and she was crying and it was terrible. Then Samuel starts crying because he cant stop and he threatened to commit suicide and so yeah it was kind of crazy. We tried to tell them how we needed to support Samuel because he was addicted, but I'm pretty sure no one in that family has an ounce of respect for him. We really stressed the importance of a family and how it was of God and how right now the parents were living in Sin. We didn't get too much resolved because we had to meet back with our companions to finish the switch, but we left with a prayer and just kind of hoped for the best. Elder Stanger and I went to pick up the family for church (both parents said they would go) and only the kids were there and ready to go. It was one of the most frustrating moments of the mission, because seriously these kids are awesome and deserve to have a good family so much, but their parents just won't help their family with the help of the Lord. So we went back the next day, and it turns out that Samuel is moving out because Ana is kicking him out. It was kind of sad, definitely not what we had wanted, but at least they're not breaking the law of chastity anymore. It was really the first time I've literally called someone to repentance. But unfortunately, the mom isn't seeming too interested in the church, I think it would be too much of a change. She says that she prayed about our message and believes that Joseph Smith was called to be a prophet, and she loves how she feels when we come to visit and how much we've helped their family, but she said that she's just too busy on Sundays and all these excuses. It was really sad, but at least her kids are really firm in the church (Rodrigo is passing the sacrament now and still going to seminary everyday) and at least she's living the law of chastity, and it's not too late for her so I think we'll just keep praying and visiting.

But this week wasn't entirely depressing, I have some pretty funny stories too. The other night, we had finished with our last compromise, I mean appointment, and we were walking back to the house. It was dark out and we were walking behind what looked like a mom with a teenager and a little girl. As we passed them Elder Stanger looked back and said "Boi Noite" just to be friendly. Well turns out that it was actually two teenagers and a little girl, and the girl (that Elder Stanger thought was a lot older than she really was) must have been pretty moved by that, because she let out an audible dreamy sigh as we walked away. Haha Elder Stanger still says that he thought she was an older woman, but I think he's just trying to cover up the fact that he totally hit on a teenage Brazilian girl.

Another funny story was that Elder Stanger and I had a serious encounter with a big rat in our house Friday night. We got home and heard something, and turned on the light to see two little rats running around the house. We had two extra matresses up againt the wall next to a box that usually holds an air conditioning unit. Well those two escaped up the mattresses and out the box into the night. Elder Stanger was a little fed up and started banging on the Oven, which is one of the rat hose spots. Well a fairly large rat hopped out and ran into our bedroom. But we had already taken down the mattresses so the little sucker was stuck in our room. Elder Stanger got a crazy look in his eye and decided that we'd shut the door to keep him locked in there while we got tools to take care of him. What ensued was a night of hell, and I'm using it in the literal sense for the record. We each had a broom and were swinging at him, but this rat was olympic. He was jumping and almost jumped out the window, he was easily jumping four or five times his own body length. Later on he climbed the door frame and was chilling like seven feen in the air, clinging on to the wood of the frame. By then end of the night he had walked all over our pillows and sheets, and we had succeeded in not even touching him. We ended up (through our pure genius) trapping him in a big trashcan, we had to put a covering on because the first time he jumped right out of the can. It was about 1100 at night and neither of us are especially cruel people, so we just left him in the can overnight with a cracker we had tried to lure him with. The next morning we had no idea what to do with him, so we tossed him out next to our house, hoping the fall would injure or kill him...but he just ran away like it was nothing. It was a good 25 foot drop! He was a worthy adversary and I think he deserved to live. We got some pretty impressive video of him jumping and climbing the door frame. I was filming him on the doorway and he totally jumped at me, so all you see on the video is the camera shake and loose focus, and two grown men yelling like little girls. It's a pretty funny video, I'll probaly try to put it on a CD or DVD or something and send it home.
That pretty much does it for the week. We had a sweet sleep over last night with the elders from the district. Normally it's just Elder Stanger and I, but we had 8 people n the house last night. One of the members in another ward makes a mean pizza (rare in manaus) with stuff crust (unheard of here) so we had a lot of that. It was pretty cool just to relax and talk with other missionaries. Today is pretty chill too, just some letter writing, and a lot of relaxing. And then after on to another week! Transfers are coming up soon so I need to start preparing to know the area really well in case I stay and Elder Stanger is transfered, which would be a little stressful at first, but I think I can handle it.

Hyrums Email: we had two more baptisms. it was way cool of Juinor and Luis. they were awesome. thye were supposed to be sat but they didnt pass the interview so pres had to come and talk to them and then pres passed them so the baptisms were sunday!!! i was soo happy to see them be baptised!!! oh that old man with he pot and straw is a drink called terere. i actually am like addictied. i drank some last night and i will be drinkin more today. :) i love it. but that guy was drunk in the moment so he was kinda out fo it. he is a dad of some members. so a little about my week. last night we had a district pizza party at my house so it was pretty fun i guess. and also two nights ago we did a FHE at that guys house and me and johnson tried to make an "american dish" which would be mac and cheese. ya, it didnt go so well. oopsi. but it was pretty fun. i wanted to wish you and dad a happy aniversary!!! you two have been together long long time. congrats. lsat week we did a pday party at Elder T. Daviss house. he goes home in like 2 weeks i think. and on the way back we were driving by the river of the amazons and guess what i saw...a cruise ship!!! i thought of you and your dream to visit here. we also had a crazy cool rat chase this week. i got lots on video so you will be able to see it when i come home.it was crazy this rat would jump like 3 feet in the air. he was huge. it was nuts haha. i am starting to study the BOM in spanish and italian. it ws good overall! the mission is getting more fun everyday!!! im loving it. haha. well love ya lots.

Rat Fight and Baptism Photos (Thanks E Johnson)

2010-03-11T07:52:00.001-08:00

The first is of the rat we had a battle with, rat battle, not rap battle. Although I think the latter would have been much more pleasant. As you can see, stretched out he was as long as both mattresses. Elder stanger caught a good pic of him in the air that I'll grap from him and try to send. the second was in the trashcan we caught him in. Can you believed he jumped right out of that thing the first time?

The third pic is at the baptism on Sunday, there were a lot of people there and it was one of my favorite baptismal services we've had. The fourth pic is of E Stanger and I in our jumpsuits that were slightly large. We both used those since everything was kind of last minute and we didnt bring our baptismal clothes

RATS! Baptisms!!!

2010-03-05T21:08:00.000-08:00

so your telling me josh h. is home? crazy!. and he is strong huh? cool i guess. im pretty strong to i guess... NOT haha. im glad you all had a good time there in florida. tht is good. im glad you like the cd of photos also.
still rats but we are searching for results haha. and no i havent found the journal. im sure its long gone by now. well a little about my week...
so this week my comp told an investigator he missed nursing haha. it was funny. so this investigator has a little boy that was like crying lots and they were like ya he misses nursing but the only thing is that the word nursing is realy close to mom in portugeuse haha. so he understood mom and was like ya me to haha. it was funny.
also we some some kids "iceblocking" only it wasnt on ice. it was cool. crative little kids. they were on little 2 liter bottles of soda slidding down the hills haha.
o so ? for ya, have you ever heard of the fruit called Guava? i heard we have it there i just dont ever remember it. but just wondering.
i got two packags this week. one from Romy which was way cool. being american in brasil receiving a package from germany. wicked haha. tell her a HUGE thanks for me.
this sunday a member brought a friend to chruch that had already been taught everything but when it was getting close to her baptism i guess she suffered a bad accident and they say it s a miracle she is alive but sunday she came up to us and told us she wanted to be taught again and baptized so we went and taught the 1st lesson marked her baptism for the 13th of march and also we will have two baptisms this week. Junior and Luis. im way excited for thes baptisms!!! it will be way cool. they are both 18 and will be 19 soon and they are moving so much. they are like my role modles. i mean can you imagine a 18 year old boy gving up lots of worldy things to be baptised.
its amazing the love of our heavenly father and how stong the holy ghost can testify to us if we really are with an open heart!!! o also this week something else funny happend. decided im a pretty big tease haha. like we were dong a FHE at a less actives house and my comp was directing the music and he was useing a zip up tie and i was sitted righ next to him so i was just like wanting to play a joke on him haha. so i just reached up and pulled the tie and it unzipped haha. it was so funny.
and also this week i did my first divisions as a DL. it was cool. i did one with the zl and also another missionary in my district!!! well ya that was about my week. its all going good. im deciding i have ALOT of time in this area. it passed WAY fast and i was like WOW, i almost have 6 months in this area already. crazy crazy.
o i still love acre to death. but im loving here now also. alot depends on your comp!

Great week except....:(

2010-03-05T21:02:00.000-08:00

well here is a little about my week. so last thursday i woke up and had the inspiration to go look at my suit that i have not worn for over 6 months. and i did and it was just covered in mold. i love the amazons. but thankfully for the expeirenced mold remover members A.K.A. Bishops wife. its getting taken care of as we speak(write). also that day we took some papers for some investigators to get married to the office. well first off we get the wrong bus. oopsi haha. so we have about an hour tour through manaus which was cool then we get the right bus and all goes well. on the way back the bus was packed full. i tell you what i have never been so close to so many ppl. and im a missionary. it was weird. but its a good thing all the ppl around me were guys haha. it was disgusting though. just imagine a hot humid area stuffed full of stinky ppl goning home from work for the day and all of us sweating tons. gross. my poor little comp haha. he had a couple of teen girls in his area. he was like so nervous it was funny. so then we get back home and we open the door and find out there is a sleep over happening in our house haha. WITH RATS. there were like at least 3 or 4 rats in our house and we were chasing them around like mad men. one was in the garbage sack and i gave him a good hit. haha. but i dont know what to do with them last night i was laying in bed and i saw a couple running around our walls in our bedroom i was like alright that is too much haha. but we put posion out a week ago and nothing happed. i thought for sure it would ttake tcare of them. haha. i will have to use the priesthood soon i think haha. jkjkj. a dad of some less active we are helpin is like a way funny guy. he is just absolutly nuts. but i have that pic of me when i was little sitting on dads lap when he was using the rainbow suspenders and i have no teeth well this old crazy guy gave me some suspenders to take home and give to dad. so tell dad i have a present for him. also something sad happend this week. i try not to think about it cause i just get depressed. but im already over it. i realize it happend and ther is nothing i can do. so thankgoodness you save these emails and stuff casue i left a suitcase with a couple of things in it in the office. like a pair of my ecco shoes brand new and well a couople things but the most important was a journal with over a year of my mission. well ya that suitcase got stolen with everything in it. so im pretty much blessed i have an amazing mom and an inspired mom who saves all this stuff i write home cause now i dont have a journal of the last year and 3 months of my mission. i also saw a guy taking a dump in fromt of our house this week on the side of the road. like seriously. in the middle of the neighborhood. gross hhuh. haha. The parents of the recent converts we had decided to get married and baptised. the dad was a raging alchoholica and would get drunk like every day and we started helping him and he hasnt touched it for almost 2 weeks!!! so she said she would marry him then we can baptize them. i pray he just continues to stay away from it!!! so remember that guy from peru a couple months ago i told you we had to speak to in spanish. well a couple months ago he told us he didnt want anything with us yet. so we were like alright but he has been goin to chruhc every sunday since then. well sunday he told me he was ready and wanted to be baptized so we marked it for the 6th of march!!!! also another investigator named Juinor is marked for the 6th. him and his friend Fabio, less-active, do break dancing so that was way cool to see. i tried to be cool and and did a little front hand spring but it was nothing compared to them haha. it was cool though i wont lie haha. so also this week i did my first intervies as a district leader. it was way weird to be like all alone with someone!

More Pics from the comps mom!

2010-03-05T20:53:00.000-08:00

So the first two pictures are the night after a long day of working, so we made cuplaço juice! It's this sourish fruit, we bought some
in a market and with the help of everton (in the picture) we made some delicious juice!

The last picture is a cool little area in the area I was in with the ZL yesterday. This little neighborhood was on the side of a road that was a big hill, and that dirt path is actually a staircase of sorts. Funny story, after I took the picture, I started descending, and the dirt just started giving away so I ended up sliding down the entire thing. In the picture is Elder Whitlock, one of our ZLs.
The first picture here is of the gift that was given to me by the crazy guy and his family, including his daughter that we're helping get married in two weeks or so.

The second and third are of the weirdest fruit I've ever seen in my entire life! It looks so weird, but you peel away the skin and there's a grape on the inside! It was way delicious, but I would have never have thought to eat something like that.

The last picture is of a miniture service project we helped with. The neighbors of Junior and Randy and Ingrid and all them were robbed because someone jumped over their wall. So we helped them mix cement and put broken glass on top of the wall so it can't happen again. They guy in the pic with Elder Stanger is Junior, who's getting baptized on Saturday!

Pics from E Johnson's Mom:)

2010-02-18T18:46:00.000-08:00

I know this is terrible... but I now have to get pictures from Hyrum's mission thru his companions mom! Ya! Not sure but the longer he is out, the less time he has please his mom... :(
So here is a copy of Hyrum's comps email and pics! Thanks....

The first three pics are of the family we baptized on Saturday the 6th, Raquel's family. From oldest to youngest: Rodrigo, Rogerio, e Ana.

The second picture is of the big group that was at the baptism, including three others that another dupla baptized, and Thalia the young girl we worked with. Jo達o who has been a member for 10 months baptized her, which was really cool since he's a good member friend of ours. The third foto is me with all the siblings from the baptism in their wooden house. The baby is Raquel's little girl, who is a pretty good friend of mine.

In the fourth foto was the other group of siblings that we worked with: Robert, Ingrid, e Randy.

And in the fifth is their whole family; we are currently working with the parents towards baptism.

More Baptisms and the Manaus Temple

2010-02-17T15:40:00.001-08:00

Loving the mission!

2010-02-17T15:29:00.000-08:00

how was your week? mine was pretty good. there is a crazy holiday here called carnival so there is just lots of parties and drunks lately but other then that its good. haha. the other night there was a huge party in front of our house haha. i loved it. haha NOT. but ya, the road was closed and there was a big stage and music and lots of drunks like literaly in front of our house. its a good thing im so dang tired at night i was out like a dead boy haha. the music didnt even keep me up!!! so we got some good investigators. were teaching a less active and helping her marry the guy she lives with, she is also pregnant. so we got all the wedding plans done. her husband isnt to interested in the gospel yet, but you can bet by the time were done with him he will be. well with lots of the Lords help of course. after all we are just tools in his hands!!! some of the other converts we had. Raquel and Rodrigo and Rogerio and Ana. well a little more info about there family. Raquel is 17, annies age and has a little baby, prob 6-9 months and she wasnt living at her house cause she didnt get along with her step dad but she lived with less active members. but since we have been teaching her and her family and helping her stepdad stop drinking there house has been a total movement! like its just a tiny little wooden house but they have hung like sheets up to make the walls look prettier and we gave them pics for the enisigns and stuff and raquel even moved back into there house. its amazing to see how huge of a differance there house and family is now. it makes me sooo happy to see them like this. we marked a family night with them and raquel with give the lesson!!! we are also teaching a man with about 30 years prob and he stopped us in the road asking for a card so he could call and get a free DVD. we were like well just give us your addy and we will be happy to pass by and so he did. well long story short we went and for a couple of weeks he was hard to find but this last week we have found him lots more and his wife left him about 5 months ago and she only lets him see there daughter on weekends and so he was like way depressed the other day and got drunk we we just remarked with him and went back and he was just way sad the next day so we taught the 3rd and focused on repentance and baptism and he accepted to prepare to be baptised. we talked about enos´s prayer to be forgive for his sins and marked it for him to read then we left. the next day went back and he was just way happier said he read and prayed and he is just progressing great. i pray that he continues with desejo and that he is baptised. the gospel can really help his life!!! yesterday we did a serive project and painted a school. well we didnt finish, we will go back friday to paint more. but i got totally trunky painting. it reminded me or our remodle on our house haha. i was like man i would totally be waiting for a 10 pack from fiesta ole right about now but instead i got a fried egg with rice haha. it was good to i guess. haha. but ya that is about my week. all is going good. this morning i got to play some more soccer alos got a letter from jatauna and tyler bates!!! i got a christmas package form wayde and mellissa, it was funny, inside they joked and said sorry its late, it will prob be a V-Day package and they put hearts on it. well come to find out i get it two days after V-Day.
i have loved the mission. its soo amazing. like so amazing in a weird way. its way hard on the body and the mind. like see and deal with soo much messed up stuff but its all good for a growing expeirience!!! it is by far the hardest thing ive ever done but also the best time. its just hard to explain but im loving it.
well love you!!

About the email from your comps mom?.....

2010-02-17T15:26:00.000-08:00

So I got an email from your comps mom telling me you are DL....

sorry i dont brag about my mission callings. i have to work on being humble. its a hard thing to have christlike atribute for me. but the district has 4 missionary groups in it. (8 elders in total) 2 are the ZL´s. the district is really yound. im the oldest in the district. one elder has like 2 weeks less then me. the other has like a month less then me, after that its young. a 11 month elder, a 7 month elder, two 9 month elders and my comp who will have 4 months soon and me with a year 1/2

Email from E. Johnson Mom

2010-02-17T15:25:00.000-08:00

Maryann,
I just wanted to send you a brief note - congratulations on your son being made a district leader. I know that Philip was very relieved that they remained companions with this transfere. I guess he had spent a day with another companion, and while he wasn't complaining, I could tell that he feels much more comfortable with your son. He was talking about getting soccer jerseys, which I guess is a big deal in terms of which team you support. When he talked about the team your son suppports, he was saying that since your son was his father, maybe he should pick that team too. Anyway, it was very sweet (my son whould hate to see me use that word!) to read what he has to say when he talks about his companion. You already know this, but I just wanted to let you know what a good companion you son is being to my son! Hope you are having a good day. We have finally dug out from our record breaking storm and I am definetely ready for the boys to go back to school!
Jill Johnson

Another Busy Week Transfers

2010-02-17T15:18:00.000-08:00

hello there how goes it. but let me tell ya a LITTLE about my week. it was a crazy week. haha. me and my comp laugh daily about this week. well one thing at a time. first of all can you tell chloe happy bday for me. oh so get this, sunday the baptismal font wasnt locked(my fault :S) haha. but there wsa a little girl in there swimiing haha. she said she wanted to be baptised haha. it was crazy funny haha. but we got her out and then locked it up. one of my ZL´s finsihed his mission so a couple of nights before we had a little sleep over at there house and had some food and sang songs and bore testimonies and stuff it was way cool and fun. this week we were also WAY blessed by the lord. we had 7 baptisms!!! it was amazing. we are still teaching the parents of some of them and im really hopping they find interest in the lessens. they are likeing them somewhat so that is good!!! transfers were this week also but me and elder johnson just stayed together!!! which im way glad cause he is a hard worker and we have a good friendship going on so its totally good.!!! also this week our ward mission leader disapeared so he had the activity in the ward wed night didnt show up so me and my comp made something up off the top of our minds, which the Lord must have helped alot cause it turned out pretty good i must say. also he didnt show up to our coralation meeting or churh or the baptisms and the bishop couldnt get ahold of him or anything so it was kinda stressfull. but ya well just hope he shows up soon. haha my comp has a hacky sack and he was kicking it and i was like wow you are bad, i can do so much better then that so i went to try and i kicked it once and it went to the other side of the room, e. johnson almost died from laughing so hard haha. it was pretty embarrisng. and the last but not least is that i got a tape from my cousin chris this week. i love that guy. haha. he is soo funny and makes some good old laughs. but ya that is about all for this week i think. i hope im not forgeting anything.

Awesome, Funny Week!

2010-01-27T12:31:00.000-08:00

no packages yet. and ya transfer are in like 2 weeks i think.
we didnt play soccer today but instead we decided to stay home and make our ginger bread house. it turned out cool. we are pretty much pros at it. i think its safer then most of the houses here haha.
so yesterday something way funny/embarassing happened. we were all walking in the road and like there is always water running down the side of the roads so the roads are all mossy so you ahve to be careful. well we were walking and my comp slips and just eats it in the water/moss/mud haha. it was funny. i could NOT stop laughing but he was laughing to so it was all good. they just dried fast and then he could brush all the dirty stuff off.
it was on our way to meet the member for pizza hut. last night a member took us to pizza hut. wow, it wsa the best thing i have eaten in like 1 1/2 years.ahhhh. it was buffet to so all i could eat. haha. i ate LOTS of pizza last night.
so we went to an investigators house and a little boy answered to door and we asked if the investigator was there he said ya so we're like 'can ya go get her'. well he comes back and is like 'she told me to tell you she isnt here'. were like 'go ask when she will be back'. he comes back and is like 'she said she left with her mom to buy groceries', 'well when can we come back', she said 'she is sleeping now'. i was like o wow. it was sooo funny.
but the work this week was good. our recent convert, raquel, took us to her families house and we have been teaching them and one of the visits her 15 yr old bro asked how he could be one of us. so we explained it. there baptism will be the 6th!!! we also gave him some church clothes cause he only had a pair of shorts and a t shirt and felt embarrased to go to chruch like that.
we had a good succesful week lots of baptisms marked and lots of investigators in chruch. i was looking around and relized that about 99% of the members here are converts. like the churhc is sooo new.
how amazing is the missionary work.
our whole ward is converts. it ws just weird to see and think about. like in our ward in the states like everyone was born into the chuch almost. it was cool!
also this week we had a cool FHE with a family. it was funny. johnson and i sang a song, well we tried. haha. it didnt go so well. so everyone was laughing and stuff. but it was good to have some fun.
this week pres. gave us a good tip. he said the spirt told him we would have more success if we talked less and asked more ?´s so we have been doing it this week and it is working great. the investigators are really opening there hearts better and taking out there doubts and stuff.. i love having inspired leaders!!!!
well love ya.

3 Baptisms! Great Week

2010-01-20T14:18:00.000-08:00

today we went to the center and on the way there was a dead body on the side of the road. its kinda normal fro me now but it was my comps first. i felt bad for him. he was a little shocked. o i got 3 packages yesterday!!!! 2 from you and one from jatauna!!! the dang rat came back and this time he wasnt my friend. he turned his back on me and got into some of my granola bars amanda sent me :( but he only got into like 3 or 4 so i just through those ones out and put the rest in the frigde. im gonna get violent with him now though haha.
this week we had 3 baptisms. it was good. 2 were kids of a less active family we are helping come back and the other was a family friend. i love that family, ive grown way close to them. they lost a son a month ago to a stabbing and so now they are wanting to come back to church. they are a good family and ive learned to appreciate the plan of salvation TONS these last weeks helping them!!!
o there were also transfers of emergency again and the other two elders left so now its just me and my comp in this area!!! so just a couple of ?s for ya. i got a package a coupld weeks ago with shampoo and soap and stuff and one thing is called shower gel... i dotn know what to use the shower gel for?
i love the family book. so many good storys and memories and lots of trunkiness haha. i decided i have a beautiful family. wow. haha. especially my neices and nephews. just adorable.
so ya, christmas was great. thanks for all the gifts. your a great mom. i liked the trunky tie also, "return with honor"(Grandma bought it). the book was awsome. that white shirt im not even gonna open, ill save it for when i come home so i can have a I really think you should adopt someone. if you really did adopt someone that person would love life. i just cant imagine the smile on her/his face of the huge move and a loving family waiting for him/her. it would be so amazing to see and take part in.
ill prob end up giving everything i own away has presents when i come home cause i just feel bad for these ppl who have nothing.
well i g2g. love ya. have a great week.

Pastor. Jokes, Mango!

2010-01-13T12:54:00.000-08:00

so i open my email this week and everyone in the fam has emailed me haha. did someone die??? i hope not. im kinda scared to read the emails.

anyway my week..... i got the paintings for you and amanda sent out today. when you get them be carefull when you open them so you dont cut it ok!!! haha.
i played a little trick on my comp this week haha. its the same old tricks that dads always do to there sons in the mission. i told him when he is full to tell the sister "estou gravida" "im pregnant" so he did it. it was funny. he laughed to after we told him. he is way cool and talking really well already. im madly impressed at his skills.

our rat friend came back to our house. i think he likes us. we made him leave last week but he returned.

so tell liz and sarah and abi and ryan and annie happy bday for me!!!

we had a baptism this last saturday and my comp did it. it was his first one and i surprised him telling him he would do it like the night before so all day the day of the baptism we walked in the streets with him saying the baptism prayer. it was funny. he was practicing lots.

also i got a pastor of a church good this week. i did a street contact and it happend to be a pastor so he was like blah blah blah. and i was like have you already heard of the BOM and he was like ya i have already read it. i was like awesome, what did you think? he was likt its horible, God is our only God and c
Christ is our Savior and if we have anything other then this we learn in the bible that its wrong and so i was like, oh so you havnt read it and he was like ah ah, well i read a little bit. so i was like oh ok, let me share a scripture with ya and i read about Christ's atonement and then i gave him a copy of the book, it was funny!!!

also we are teaching a family thats less active and there kids arent members so we will baptize them saturday now. one of them made a birthday on monday so we did a surprise party cause they didnt have money to do anything. so we invited members and had a cake and everything. it turned out way cool!!! but ya that was more or less my week.

oh one more thing. yesterday i ate a 2 pound mango!!!mmm mmm good. i love mango.

New Comp!

2010-01-06T09:57:00.000-08:00

ok so some of the americans that were stuck in the usa with visa problems got visas this week so im training one and my old comp got another comp with 9 months so now us four are in our area!!! i love training. its soo fun and it makes me work and try WAY hard. its funny how little he talks and understands. he is from maryland and he has about 5 days in brazil. he went to the mtc in provo cause of his visa. his name is Elder Johnson. its so funny to see his face and reactions to stuff here. i now remember how it is being new. everything is crazy for ya. I speak mostly port. every once in a while english when i can see he is hating life. haha. but i made a goal with him that half way through the transfer we just speak port.

January 6th Awesome week

2010-01-06T08:51:00.000-08:00

but this week for me was AWESOME. yuppers. haha. i got two packages. one from amanda and chris and one from you. i got the calander from you. i freakin love it haha. its like the trunkiest awesome present i have ever gotten haha.
:S Jonh Bytheway´s nephew is in our mission. he is funny haha.
um we have some good investigators. we kinda moved where we were working and were focussing on a different part of the area now, i think it will work out good. im like WAY excited to work now. like im walking extra fast and just talking to everyone and just like YAAAA. haha.
i was studing a little in the gospel priciples book and i was studying about how were all children of God which makes us brothers and sisters and then there was a ?, " knowint that were all children of God, how does that make you act, talk, and do" or something like that, and i aplied it to my mission of course and i thought how sad it would be to get to heaven and see lots of my family not entering into there cause i didnt talk to them when i had the chance. like Christ said the only way to enter into the kingdom of God is being re born with water and spirit (transilating from port to english so its not excatly right). so its my job to help ppl be baptized and continue until the end!!!!

so new year night also was, well, the worst of the mission. haha. we get home the 3st from working and were all sweaty right, well we didnt have water to shower, haha. so we were like ok nothing we can do lets just go to sleep so we lay down and turn our fans on and the the electricity goes out so we have no fans, and then the fireworks and stuff just added more noise to an imposible noite to sleep. it was AWESOME. haha. well there is some of the stuff from the week!!!!

Amazon Float

2009-12-24T06:02:00.000-08:00

well im glad that everything in the package made it to you. im glad you liked it to. did everyone open the presents or so you? glad you liked the dvds also. they are pretty cool. that is ALL of my pics in the mission and so now your all caught up. well except for the pics i have taken since then haha. so ya i havnt received any packages yet but no worries i will. so about the river, WOW, it was awesome, like i cant even explain it. it was soo pretty and amazing how the two river waters dont mix for like miles. and they litteraly dont mix. not even a little. it looks like something is seperating them it was way cool. we also got to watch a movie, the cronicals of narnia, it was cool and i saw elder orr. haha. it was a great day yesterday!!! Pics to come!

Mollie Born!

2009-12-24T05:57:00.000-08:00

so becca had her baby!!! congrats for her. i was gonna ask about her today haha. i knew it was coming up!!! what day? and i will get to see elder orr and the amazon river. im going to the encounter of waters, its where the two rivers make the amazon river. it will be cool!!! so as we are having sacrament meeting there is a funeral going on in the cultral hall behind us with a dead body there haha. it was VERY distracting, and to top it all of they were using a projecter for sacrament meeting. ahhh, the church here is soo crazy haha.

Dec 2, 2009

2009-12-02T13:20:00.000-08:00

this week was cool we had a zone conf. with pres. it was about the BOM. we got burnt on not using the BOM enough. so we will be using it more. haha. we watched some clipps from Elder Hollands talk, wow, i love that talk, it was like my favorite talk i have ever hear in my life. also i found out what pres is gonna do for the christmas conferance. im way excited for this one. ALL the missionaries in the mission (meaning i will see elder orr and elder t davis) are coming here to manaus!!! pres is trying to rent a boat and take us to the encounter of waters. its where the two huge rivers meet and make the Amazon river. one of the rivers is like black and the other brown and so when the waters meet they dont mix for a long time so its like a river with one side black and one side brown. there should be some pics online i imagine. but it is gonna be sooo awesome. im sooo freaking excited to see elder orr and elder t davis again!!!! also we had a baptism this sundya!!! that was way cool. it was the daughter of a less active that we are reactivating!!! her name is Larissa! this last saturday night the electircity was flickering and it ended up burnig our fans, like literaly, our fans cought on fire haha. so we had no fans sat night and then sunday we couldnt buy any so sunday night we died of a heat stroke also. haha. but then monday we went to buy some fans!!! o something else i realized is that NO one else wil have babies before i get home now. its passed the time already!!!! yayay.

2009-11-11T07:07:00.000-08:00

Our Prez. is a great guy. i love sister. she is soo innocent it is funny at times. haha. but ya my comp its gettin lots better haha. last week he had an emergency to use the bathroom but we werent at home and the bathroom we were by didnt have toilet paper so he used plastic bags on the floor. haha. poor kid. i remember what it ws like being newer haha. this is his 3rd transfer. he is talking way better then i did with 2 or 3 transfers. he is doing good. i know who those brazilian girls are. they are some less active members in this ward that we are trying to reactivate. they have been going to chruch like 3 or 4 weeks in a row and we baptized their friend a week ago. i pray they get better and stay active. were helping them lots. but if there making my facebook dirty like that you can tell annie to delete them. tell emma happy bday for me. one of our investigators this week got in a fight with his wife and she stabbed him in the leg. its nasty. his leg is alll black and gross now. haha. brazil is messed up ahha. but he wants to be baptised soo much but he cant cause they arnt married so he wants to leave but he has no money to leave so he is in a tough situation. also a family we are teaching is awesome. im loving them. we had a way spirtiual lesson and we talked about baptism and the mom went off saying how she didnt feel like her first baptism was right and how she is looking for the right one. and she started to cry i was, well just teary eyed, i dont cry haha. but it was awesome. i love that family!!!! ya all is great here!! lvoe ya!

2009-10-21T14:43:00.000-07:00

we have a mission home. but my area is the furthest away from the mission office. it takes like an hour and a half to get to the mission office so i never go there but i live with the assistants so the always bring my letters and packages!!! yes i got a package this week with spegetti and prego and dille beans and i got the belt a week or two ago. thanks a ton for everything!!!! your the best mom EVER!!! so there is a little boy in my ward witht the name of Hyrum. it is funny how the say it though haha. this week we had zone conf. it was way good. one of the elders that is finishing bore his testimony and talked about how he was a recent convert before his mission and when he decided to go on a mission his dad said no but he went any way. he said he has written his dad every week and his dad has NEVER written him back. how sad is that. he said he never gets letters packages or anything. i felt so bad. but i tihnk of how much faith he must have and how strong of a testomony. a mission is hard enough with family support. i cant imagine how hard it would be with out it. my comp is just sick alot. just like pains in the stomoch. but its normal for americans. also his feet hurt really bad caouse of blisters. so some days we dont even leave the house cause his feet hurt so bad and he cant walk. like the blisters burst and get infected. haha. poor kid. i was reading in alma 17 this week and i loved a scripture i was studing about patience in verse 11. it is totally how with my patience i will be a tool in the lords hand for the lamanites. that is a prophecy that im making part of. cool huh??1!!!!

im reading jesus the christ and so that is like WOW, AMAZING. haha. im loving it. i read like half the book yesterday alone haha.

well love ya mother. your the best!!!!

New Area

2009-10-14T07:12:00.000-07:00

Manaus is good. im enjoying it. the ppl here are alot smarter then in rio branco!! haha. lets see. sunday was testimony sunday and a guy from mexico city was here for buisness and he bore his testomony in spanish and i understood everything. i was like wait i never studied spanish and i didnt know it before the mission. haha. it was weird but cool for sure. its kinda an ugly language but dont tell ryan that. haha. also here in manaus, being in the middle of the amazon jungle has some beautiful rain/thunder stomrs. its amazingly great. the thunder is way loud though haha. and the rain is really HARD and its not even the reain season yet. everyone says in november or december it starts up for real. also for lunch on sunday i ate aligator. it was good. its kindal like chicken. kinda. haha. um my comp is cool. he got a little sick this week but i think he is better now. the roomies are cool. trunky casue they go home next transfer haha. but i love them. um pics...well i forgot my camera in the house today so next week maybe haha. sorry. no the language is about the same. ppl here are smarter so they actually conjugate the verbs corectly haha. um bakc is fine. no worries there. its not hurting at all. that is crazy about brett. is he ok now. i got mine taken our at the beginning of my mission but i never told you casue i didnt want you to get all worried up haha. but it was kinda crazy. i got a cool scare now. haha. jkjk. ive been blessed with health haha. well i apriciate the prayers and pray for you tons to. lov ya

transfers! Trunky... Happy... Sad... oct 2nd

2009-10-14T07:08:00.000-07:00

Hippy friend!

well this week was awesome then sad then sad then trunky then awesome agian haha. let me start from the start. CONFERANCE. holy wow it was just great now wasn't it??? i loved it. Elder Hollands talk was just AMAZING huh?? he was like screaming and giving such a strong testimony. i absolutly loved the conf. this last weekend. i also recognize one of the 70. i think his name was Elder Nielson or something like that. i loved his talk about mission work. it was awesome. i think he is the one that helped me pick my mission suit that one day. haha. thats cool. then it got sad cause i found out i was getting transfered. i loved my area in rio bracno and also my comp. so it was way sad to leave there (recent converts members elders comp and etc...) but then it went to sad again when i had to pay 70 reais (35 dollars) on baggage cause mine was to heavy. but then it got trunky. in the airplane coming to manaus. i always thought the next time i would be on a plane would be on the way home haha. so all i could think about is how it would be flying home haha. then it got even trunkier when i got here in manaus and had about 100 letters and a package from you and melissa. haha. but then it got cool again when i got my new comp who is from northern idaho and my new area. im living in the area with the assistants so i will have to stop slacking and work now haha. but im totally lost right now. this city is HUGE and the ward has like ward missionaries and all the leaders and stuff. its weird haha. i havn't had a full ward my whole mission. in my last ward i had to give a talk at least once a month. but now the elders said we never give talks. its great haha. but ya im excited to get to know my area and the ppl here!!!! i got a letter from you chastising me for sending lame emails latly haha. so sorry about that. i will try to get better and my emailing. its just that stuff gets normal to me so ya. anyway sorry. :)

Sept 30.. Life in Brazil

2009-09-30T06:46:00.000-07:00

Goodbye Elder Rosa Me, O'Connor, Davis, Millet, Fox, Yuri, Flores, Rosa

Brandon Frisbe, Me, Brandon, Gabriel, Davis, Millet, Fox

Fresh Banana

i saw a snake like two months ago but ppl were killing it. i dont know about transfers yet. it will prob be tuesday.but im cool with staying cause my comp is cool. anyway this week... well last pday we played some frisby and football with a member in our ward and other missionaries. it was WAY fun to do something other then soccer. all the believe in here is soccer. also Adalgisa, our recent convert, bought me a manicure and pedicure. haha. now that was totally weird haha. ya i felt gay but i coulndt tell her no. haha. also i ate some weird food that is like a plant and it is supposably really healthy for ya but it like numbs your mouth. the call it Tacacá or something like that. Another recent convert, the one i sent you a picture of us drinking Açai. well she bought me a new belt cause she said the one i was useing was ugly and it was. haha. we also had a baptism on sunday so that was GREAT!!! :) the Lord is blessing us soo much this transfer!!! this week the grocery store got new ketchup and mustard and its Heinz. its 10 reais for each. its rediculous haha. the others are like 1 reai but ya it was a great week. im LOVING it!!!

More Blessings!

2009-09-30T06:38:00.000-07:00

Franciuldo

Silandia Sept 20th

Alexandre Sept 17th

My Apartment

2009-09-30T06:35:00.000-07:00

Company:(

Study and Kitchen

Outside my door

Laundry Rm

Bathroom

Bedroom

Sept 22.. Loads of Work!

2009-09-23T06:55:00.000-07:00

well hello. haha. this week was great. and i dont walk like a brazilian and never will. im tall white and handsom haha. jkjk. but ya this week was good. we are teaching a man with 25 years and he will be baptized this sun or next. it was for this sun but then he got stung by a sting ray so we will see. we did have two baptisms this week. Alexandre who is the son of Antonia, a recent convert we baptised a couple months ago and also a daughter of a member!!! the lady (daughter of member) name is Silandia. she has two boys that remind me of ander cause they are...energetic haha. and she is 7 months pregnant. but she moved back in with her family cause her husband left her. :( but she is amazing. we are also teaching another couple who i pray we can prepare for conferance weekend to be baptised!!! so something funny this week. here in brazil there are holes allover in the roads. like sewer holes without the metal caps and then holes on the side of the road for water to drain from rain storms and stuff. so its totaly dangourous. but this week we were walking and it was night so it was dark and i was talking to my comp and all the sodon he disapeared. haha. he fell into a hole. it was funny. he didnt get hurt. just bruiesed his leg. also one of the sisters in our ward washed all of our clothes which was great. cause i still havnt learned how to use these machines. my clothes always come out feeling like cardboard. haha. good week. love ya.elder stanger

Labor Day Week 09

2009-09-10T06:46:00.001-07:00

Great Jerseys!

Service

Gabriel, Nancy, Comp

gone gangster!

gabriel's birthday

comp killing a tree!

family baptism

serving others

so... just a few things about this week. sunday we finaly got a ward mission leader. so im way excited for that!!! he is the bishops son and he got back from his mission like a month ago!!! also yesterday we had zone conf with the pres and sister. it was awesome. i learned lots.

ONE YEAR!

2009-08-30T06:28:00.000-07:00

so this week was cool.
sunday i went to my last area for a brithday party of that family we were teaching that wasnt married and we were trying to marry them. the rich family. well i got there and they were way excited to see me as i was to see them. it was way cool. the mom was so excited she like ran up to me and hugged me and kissed me haha. i was like uhhh haha. it was way weird. haha. but its normal in brazil. you hug and kiss everyone. its like shaking hands in brazil. haha. it was funny. but anyway they said they decided to get married!!!! YES. that means they will be able to be baptized.
my comp went to manaus this week to renew his visa and the comp of Elder mason was transfered so me and elder mason hung out this week haha. it was way fun. elder mason is going to train again so i will have a little brother and wont be the only son anymore :( haha. but ya it was a great week.
yes! it has been a year, but i dont think i will burn a shirt casue they get warn out faster casue of the way we have to wash them :( so i will keep all the ones i have to make it to the end of my mission!!!

well i hope all is great iwth you all!!! i love ya!love elder stanger

August 19, 2009

2009-08-19T07:43:00.000-07:00

our contacts are going good. the mission rule is 25 per week and we are doing it but this last week the 25 street contacts we did only 3 lived in our area. that is the problem with working in the center.

my comps name is Elder T. Davis. he is from oregon but his fam moved to salt lake recently. he turned 21 on sunday and has a year and 4 months in the mission. he is way cool. prob my fav comp so far. were doing just great. i have no clue if i will be transfered. prob not though. and the transfers will be sunday.

the food is still just rice and beans. i dont think it will change to much. every once in a while there is a weird meat or somethign but ill let ya know when that happens ok!!!

the weather, well its still bloody hot haha. my toe is good but now another one is hurting. its the one that i broke a few years ago but never straightened it. but o well thats misson life right!!!

and ya the drive on the spyder thruough yellowstone sounds like a BLAST. and romantic. ill for sure do that with a girl when i get back..hahaha.
well we are teaching a family and the husband is a member and was baptised like 20 years ago but inactive this whole time and we got his wife as a referance so we taught her found out her husband was a member!!! so they went to chruch sunday and were received great. brazilians are so friendly. and she read 3 nefi 11 and she asked us if she good be baptised with her kids. so we were like heck ya haha. we makred for the 30th of this month!!!! yes reactivate a man and baptise a family :).

so this week we got home to houre house and i saw a cockroach onthe ground so i killed it. then i saw another and another and so on...haha. we found there hiding place under the sink and we killed about 50 that night and then woke up the next day with daiarria because of all the chimicals we used to kill them. i think we got a little sick haha. but now were all good so now worries :)

also Anita, a recent convert was way cool/funny this week. the cool part is we had an Açai party at her house. we drank TONS of açai haha. the funny part is my comps bday was sunday and here in brazil they sell towels with naked girls on them. so after chruch we go to anitas house and she gives my comp a naked girl towel. it was weird. haha. but ya thats this week. some ?´s for you.

well love ya

New Comp & Loads of Fruit

2009-08-12T21:23:00.001-07:00

Coconut

Papaya

Garbage

Fruit

hey mother. ya i have a new comp. his name is Elder T Davis. he is from oregon but his family has recently moved to salt lake. he is way cool and he is from the manaus mission so im learning LOTS of new rules and stuff of how pres jayme works. its way diff the pres milder but im just doing my best to get used to the new mision life. its really weird some stuff. but all is great

Life is Great!

2009-08-07T07:34:00.000-07:00

Dear Family, How goes beautiful 1st world country? All is going great here. I am hoping you have not forgotten me... (no mail?) Well, let's see... you have already heard about the Mission division. That's crazy huh? I mean. I am serving in "two" missions as a young man!
News from here: My toe is killing me! I think I might be going to the hospital and amputate it:( I hate pain.) Other than that, life is great!
There are NO tourist here. They do not know Acre even exists. There are some hotels, but they are by the hour if you know what I mean.
I want to bring a monkey home with me next year. They're cute little guys.
I am living in an apartment right now. It's about the size of Annie's Room... That is including study area kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, laundry room etc.... It's tiny! Ha Ha. You guys are really blessed. We are really blessed. The ppl. we teach here live in houses worse then our old wooden barn but smaller. They don't have plumbing so everything (poop, pee, shower water, sink water, garbage, etc.. ) just goes in the streets so it's all really swampy and gross as you can imagine. It is a crazy life.. Just imagine living in that wooden barn... cooking, sleeping, eating and NO you do not get a bed, just a blanket on the floor and YES the bugs stay there too. That is how it is. For water to wash the dishes and stuff they just have a bucket full next to the sink cause NO plumbing to pump water to the house. The other day I was teaching and most of the time we sit on the floor cause ppl don't have chairs, but while I was teaching a cockroach came and visited me. I hate those litle guys. They are annoying! Well that's all folks! Love you lots!
(note from mom: PLEASE WRITE HIM)

BATHROOM :)

2009-08-06T06:34:00.001-07:00

OH MY!
This is a bathroom at a house. this is how almost all the house bathrooms are in the neighborhood we are working. WAY poor. I just go behind houses or something, i think its more sanitary haha.

House fallin down!
River!
Me Brandao Comp

Arison & Me!
Taken at Anita's home, a recent converts home.

She is AWESOME!

August 6th.. A visit to a Chacara

2009-08-06T06:15:00.000-07:00

so about my week. well, not a whole lot happend this week. it was more like just a normal week. i did eat some armidillo. i dont know how to spell it but it was alright tasting.

yesterday we went to a chacara of a member. its like a cabin in the jungle haha. but it was AWESEOME. so so so much fruit there that is way good. haha. like lots of fruit. and these chacaras are WAY cheap. to buy the land and the house it cost like $12,000 dollors and its like alot of land. like the size of our lane and yard and draw at our house!!! and there are tons of fruit and animals. its cool. but ya that was about all that happend this week.

cute dog pineapplevacation time!
comp kissing dog!
Ya! It's a big SpYder!
Fish!
Cacau

last night the ward did a surprise good bye party for my comp. it was really good.
Adalgisa, the lady we baptised two weeks ago is WAY firm...she is doing great. she will help the ward here a ton. but she bore a quick testimony at the party and it was awesome. she was just thanking us soo much for finding her and helping her move her life and how she will never forget about us for her wholel life.!!!!

week of July 31st, 2009

2009-08-01T18:49:00.000-07:00

my pres. well he is way laid back. ive only met him once but he is way relaxed and laid back. haha. this last year will be alot dif then the first year of my mission. im way excited. i know i will love it. i will be able to breath a little i think haha. i love pres milder to its just they are diff ppl and i love them both and ya haha. its gonna be great.. and 3 packages? what did you put in them haha. thats alot of stuff haha. thats nuts. but ya. all is great here. love ya lots.
we had a baptism sunday!!! her name is Adalgisa. she is way cool. she was deff being prepared before we met her. she was a referance from a member. so we had some FHEs with her and her family. she loved them and so we continued teaching her. she had a few big problems with some comandments but she dropped them all like it was nothing!!! for example she smoked and drank ALOT of coffee. she droped those two things like it was nothing and she was also having a big problem with the 7th comandment inthe 10 comomandments. ya she was sleeping with her best friends husband and her best friend didnt know. she been with him for 10 years and has 2 kids with him but when we taught her this comandment she talked to the guy and put and end to it. she will be a great member. she is very well educated which is hard to find here and she makes good money and is already paying her tithing!!!! she will be a great help for the chruch here. also there were some ppl from Peru here this last week selling cool hand made stuff so i bought a couple of cool things!!! :) also this week it got WAY cold. i almost died. it got to like 60 degrees i think but here no one is prepared. all i had to sleep with was a sheet but a recent convert game me a little blanket that helped a little i think. haha. i dont know because i was still dyeing from the cold. ahha. i slept in a sweater pants socks and all sorts of clothing. haha. i also didnt shower for like 3 days cause the water was SOOOO cold haha. and another thing this week that is way crazy. the moms here LOVE the scripture in proverbs 23:13-14. every one uses this scripture. its anoying. i feel bad for the kids here cause they all get beat. seriously. we got to a house and there was a liittle boy kneeling in a pile of beans and we asked why and she said she was hitting him and wanted to stop so she put him there and we asked why in beans and she said casue it makes it hurt worse. yikes. haha. another lady took telefone wire and made like a whip out if it and beats her kids with it. ppl here are CRAZY ! but ya that was my week. it was great. well the baptism part haha.
and have a great week.elder stanger

Baptisms

2009-07-22T08:31:00.001-07:00

Adalgisa

Taty

Juliana

Antonia e Jygliane

Antonia

Jully 22 Weekly News

2009-07-22T08:01:00.001-07:00

that is absolutly crazy about tuck. its sad for sure. but the baptisms went good. during antonias baptism someone stole her money. that was sad. but she isnt puttin the blame on the chruch so that is good. but i cant belive someone stole money in a churh while the person was being baptised. that is just messed up haha. but it was sad cause it was all the money she had and she was out of gas in hter house and wont get paid until sunday again. so she cant cook food now and she has 4 kids. :( but she is making it by. ppl here know how to live with nothing. our area is a little hard. we have a neighborhood were we can baptize every week prob but these ppl dont stay active. they are more worried about eating tomorrow then paying tithing and going to chruch. and all the other areas are "rich" so the ppl dont even let us in. its tuff. but we will figure something out!!! and conference was good. i got to meet the new pres and his wife. he is way dif then pres milder haha. he is way more laid back and relaxed. i was like surprised. but im going to love it. its gonna be way fun this next year. they are from the new york area and they are both converts. these last few years they have lived in hawaii cause he has been teaching at byu-h! he served a mission in brazil and his wife doesnt know port. haha. it is funny when she talks to us. she is trying sooo hard to learn. but ya all is great here. and no i havnt goten the bday package yet but just wait a little longer. :) love ya.elder stnager

Work is great!

2009-07-15T07:07:00.000-07:00

hey all is going great here. and ya i got some photos and i planned on sending them today but i forgot the cord in the house. oopsi haha. sorry i will have to send them next week.
We had two baptisms this sunday! it was awesome. we met them at a FHE we did in the house of some recent converts and taught them and baptised them. the parents of them both arnt married but just living together so they cant be baptised. and to get married here it takes over a month haha. its ridiculous. but the parents of one of the girls are getting readin the get married in august. but there names and Taty, and Juliana. well lets see. Juliana is like 10 and her big brother was baptised like a year ago but is inactive. and now we are teaching her big sister and she wants to be baptised this sunday. but there parents arnt really interested and there not married either so ya. but the other one, Taty, is like 13 and she is the only child in her family. she is way weird. like she zones out way easy. haha. it was tough to teach her cause she was always zoneing out haha. but her parents are somewhat interested and have plans to get married in august. they are cool to so we are somewhat teaching them. but we cant do much untill they get married.
and my comp, his name is Elder Espenschied and he is from utah and he goes home in 3 weeks. but its all good. this week also we will have conferance with the new mission pres. im way excited to meet him. let me see what else. o my bday package, what did you put in it haha. cause it will take a while to get to me if it ever does haha. but ya this week was good. we are teaching lots of ppl. and have lots of dates marked for sunday. im just praying it all goes as planned!!! but all is wonderful
about the temple in manaus. i dont know if it will be done before i go home. prob not but i dont know. i will take pics of it when im there. The Manaus Brazil Temple will be the sixth temple built in Brazil.
The Manaus Brazil Temple is the only temple that features a port entrance for patrons traveling by way of the river.

2009-07-09T11:41:00.000-07:00

new mission... new comp...a day at the park!

i still dont know my pres. his name is pres jayme and he is american that is it. me and my comp are working way hard. some stuff from this week. i held a monkey and ya thats about it cool haha. we have a few good investigators. one wants to be baptized but she cant cause she isnt married and her bf is a drugy and they live behind the drug dealer (i saw bags and bags of coke there) haha. she wants to leave him but doesnt have a place to go with her 3 little kids. its a tough situation. they live in a house 100 times worse than our old wooden barn.

the toe kills haha. it hurts bad. i dont know what happend. it just happend haha. but i think it might be gettin better haha. it sucks to walk all day with it haha. but the monkey is cute huh. im gonna bring one home haha. but no not really. everyone is poor. but she is looking for an bedroom to rent. but like her house she lives in now is prob a little smaller than annies bedroom. THE HOUSE. and bathrooms here are just like outside in the ground. it kinda sucks cause we have to walk through all the crap and mud and stuff cause its just like a poop swamp casue there is no plumbing. kinda gross. like they put wood boards on the ground to walk on so you dont sink in the poop/mud.

im in the capital of the state. there are nicer neighborhoods with tolets in the houses but there richer and dont like us. haha. so we work in the poor areas. the houses are built in the air cause the city drains the water from rain storms where these houses are. so every year during rain season the ppl have to leave and live in the streets cause there house go under water. but there poorer and love us. like everyone knows us in these neighborhoods. the bathrooms are a little gross. the are built of wood with a wooden seat to sit on but its just so ppl dont see you cuz its just opended and goes to the groudn and stuff. so the water from shower, pea, and poop just go on the ground. every "bathroom" you walk by will be stinky around it and swampy with wooden boards to walk past it. its great. haha. i will try to sneak a pictiure of one some time. ppl love to steal cameras here so i have to be careful with the pics. i LOVE 3rd world countrys haha.

MANAUS MISSION!

2009-07-01T13:27:00.000-07:00

NO LONGER IN THE CUIABA MISSION!
so just to let you know this week was absolutey nuts haha.
i dont know if you have looked at some of the emails i have forwarded to you yet but this week we recieved a letter from the 1st pres of the churhc and it explained how they aproved a division in some of the missions in brasil. so the mission brasil cuiaba got divided and the north of the mission got moved to mission brasil manaus in the amozons. and since i was in the north part i got moved to the mission brazil manaus. so looks like we will have a better opportunity to visit the amozons now haha. also the cuiaba mission grabbed part of a dif mission more south and so on... but to make a long story short im in the mission brasil manaus now haha. here is my new address for letters spread the word so ppl dont send letters to cuiaba anymore ok hahaha

Birthday Week

2009-06-24T09:17:00.000-07:00

kids at my bday

dead small snake(for ander)

e sant´anna-suali-me-fredson-fredryk

me and carlos

me and lenilton

Investigators

Cute Hats

Presents

Members with cake on face

Birthday Cake

Birthday Lunch

well my bday rocked. Fredson and his family (investigators) through me a surprise party and they invited over alot of members and stuff.it was wicked cool. the cake was good to. also remember about a year ago on the news when they found the indians here in brazil that arnt civilized. like the plane flew over and the were like shooting it with bows and arrows? well i think that is in my mission. if you want to do more reasearch on it you can but some members were talking about it and stuff and they said it happend in Cruzeiro do Sul which is part of my mission. thats the city i was telling you the misionaries go there by airplane cause there is no road. and also its the furthest part of the mission. there are 4 misionaries there. obviously the lost indians arnt in the actuall city but the area is in the city of Cruzeiro do Sul. cool huh. well how was your B-day? great i hope. and fathers day. did you guys do anything fun? did you get your bday present from me yet? o i got transfered today. welll im going to be. i havnt left yet. but im staying in acre. im just moving areas. ill be in the center now. the rio branco ward. so its cool. maybe ill have a post office now hahaha. well love ya and hope all is well. how is liz and the baby?

Grandma who?

2009-06-19T19:03:00.000-07:00

so wow. haha. i was looking at lizs blog and saw a lady with white hair at the cemetary with liz and her kids so i figured it was one of her friends or something. then i saw more pics of everyone at our house have like a camp fire and stuff and the same lady was there and i was like who in the heck is that. a new family friend? as i kept looking i was like HOLY thats grandma. it took like 5 minutes to think of who it was. well i think its grandma. i still cant see her as grandma, but its my only guess.

Hyrum Cries!

2009-06-19T18:58:00.000-07:00

Butterfly Kisses

Our Laundry Room

Our Kitchen

Bathroom

Brazil Flag and Bridge

Our Chicken Friend

FHE with Investigators

Last Picture with Zone before Prez leaves

Last Picture with Prez & Sister Milder & Elder ...

so my week. we had a FHE with our inverstigators family. it was awesome. we had lots of members there. like 20 ppl in total. thats good cause its like half the ward haha. also this week i went on a division and the house i stayed at had a tree in the front with like 6 or 7 monkeys. it was totally awesome haha. they were like swinging from the branches and stuff. it was cool. but guess what. i didnt bring my camera on the division. but dont chastise me. ive already repented and will take my camera on the next divison. haha. and yesterday i was like a littel baby. holy, just thinking about it now makes me want to cry again. we had our last conferance with Pres. and sister Milder. i was just balling like a baby when we were hugging and saying goodbyes. it was way way WAY harder then i thought it would be. i didnt want to say bye. to be honest it sucked haha. it was weird though cause sister milder hugged all of us. the first time a girl has hugged me in almost a year. but ya. its sad. ive learned SO much from those two. like SOO much. i cant even explain all of it now. but wow. i will never forget them and i will do whatever it takes to meet up with them after the mission again. he has ALOT of KNOWLEDGE. lets just put it that way. but ya that was my week. it was wicked awesome. love ya.elder stanger

June 10th, 2009 Cow Stomach!

2009-06-10T14:35:00.000-07:00

hey how is everything there. here all is great. a couple of things from the week.
this week we were visiting a recent convert and guess what was inside the house in one of the corners...a bee hive haha. how great huh. it was huge haha. like he said its been there for a long time and he is just leaving it there. imagine a bee hive in your house haha.
also this week i ate something really gross haha. it was awesome. cow stomac, mmm mmm good. and
the family that feed us this picked us up in his motorcycle, he has welded a little cart on the side of it so me and my comp put on pink helmets and rode in it. it was awesome haha.
but ya thats the stories for this week. the family were teaching still hasnt made plans for marriage. Fredson said he wanted to cause he wants to be baptized but when we asked her she said no. so were still working on them. they love us though. they give us sooo much food and stuff and today they invited us over and had a BBQ for us. there cool. ya thats my week more or less.

Acre Vegatation

2009-06-04T06:57:00.000-07:00

a fruit called inga. good but weird and a tree that gives liquid for rubber

June 3rd 09 No Post Office!

2009-06-03T11:21:00.000-07:00

Pictures from the town of Rio Branco

Elder Stanger is a missionary in the ward of aquiry and the branch is conquista

my week was great. i dnt have a post office in my area so i cant send letters to you every week now. sorry. so. we went to a members house this week. come to find out every time there is a new missionary in the area he takes a shower when there at his house. so he always comes out of the bathroom with a towel and goes to shake your hand and lets go of the towel. it was a little weird. haha. also church...well it is a different church here. wow. i didnt even think i was in our chruch. haha. duing sacrament the bishop was up there talkin to ppl. during sacrament he was at the pulpit asking ?s to the reilef socity pres. and she would respond to him and then he would ask a ? to someone else and the other person would resopnd. DURNING SACRAMENT haha. weird. and the the 1st conselhor of the stake pres. gave a talk. haha. wow. he was like screaming. it was messed up. i felt lke i wsa in one of those chruches were there ppl are screaming. it was crazy. i left there screming amen and hallaluja almost haha. also we are teaching a family way cool. the parents arnt maried so we cant baptize them yet but they are way cool. everytime we teach them we leave that house with like 2 sacks of food. haha. its great.

1st Contact with the Jungle Missionary!

2009-05-28T14:41:00.000-07:00

TALKING BIRD

Happy Mother's day!

Photos of 2nd area:

the fruit is called CUPUAÇU. i never ate the fruit but the juice AWESOME!

ACAI BERRY JUICE

9 MONTHS!

ONE OF MANY SPYDERS

May 28th Questions:

1. Tell me ALL about the bus ride

2. Tell me All about the plants

3. Tell me about the animals where you are

4. Tell me ALL about your comp

5. Tell me about the apartment

6. Tell me about the weather

7. Tell me about the people in your new area

8. Tell me about your contacts

9. Tell me about the ward/branch

10. Tell me about the food

11. Tell me about the terrain (rivers, jungle, city, houses, etc...)

wow with all these ?s i would think i had over a year in this area haha. but i will do my best with the responses. the bus ride was WAY long haha. it was crazyness. it was cool though cause there was a river without a road so we had to drive on a boat and it took us across the river. it was a great bus ride though. :)lets see the plants, well there is alot more fruit plants here. like juices and fruits are crazy good here. i thought cuiaba had lots of fruits, i was wrong haha. animals, i dont like the animals that are here. they have big spiders and snakes and you know how i am with spyders and snakes. my comp is from rio de jeneiro. he is black and cool. i like him. my house is, well worse then the first one but pretty much the same. lots of cockroaches and bugs in it and that is normal. my bed is worse, but o well. the weather is still bloody hot haha. its more humid i think but its pretty much the same. hot hot hot. the peple are awesome. the change from the US to cuiaba and cuiaba to here were like the same. the ppl here are awesome. i was in love with them after the first day. like they are awesome. they are so much more poor but so happy and just awesome. most of the houses are wood houses built up in the air. its cool. i know notheing about the ward yet cuase sunday was stake conf so i havnt been to a normal sunday yet. but i hear its....ya. haha. the bishop has no counselers and doesnt live in the area, the priesthood quorm pres...well dont have one or reilfe socity pres and ya. its a little dissorginized haha. the food well, rice beans and fruit. and lots of jungle and ya. thats aobut all i know as of now. its all going great.

i havnt seen a snake yet. i just hear the stories of everyone "wow we just saw a huge snake and killed it over there" haha. but like a yard long. i hope i dont see any haha.

Acai juice here its like 2 reias (75 US cents) for alot.

our house is cement. the missionaries have nicer houses so ppl cant rob us.

the ppl are awesome and offer us everything. one recent convert here i feel so bad for. he is older and his bike got stollen. a bike here is like a car in the states. its like everything. it was sad when he was talking about it. i wanted to go buy a bike for him. its expensive for these ppl but for us nothing. but i cant go out buying bikes for everyone.

the fruit is called CUPUAÇU. i never ate the fruit but the juice of acai is mmm AWESOME. its like everywere. its so good. it is a weird fruit though. HOLY its awesome. haha.

yup. its all pretty great. im gonna bring some juice home when i come home. well the pulp so we can make juice so you guys can taste it.

but my area is aquiry. and my comp has 1 yr and a half and he is from rio de jeneiro. yes LOTS of bugs but there was in cuiaba to.
the ppl are happy i just feel bad cause of how blessed we are and still complain. they are so happy with litterly nothing. one recent convert recived a liahona in the mail from pres and he almost died of happiness. he was so happy. every time we passed by his house that day he was holdint the envolope in his arms. THE WHOLE DAY. I live in a neighborhood. and ya its soo humbling. i love to be around these ppl. its not a compitition who has the best car, nicest house, best clothes. its everyone loves everyone. its awesome.

we walk. we're poor. and ya i will love it. the bugs arnt weird to me anymore. its like weird to say its normal. like walk in the bedroom or bathroom and have cockroaches and stuff. NORMAL haha. but ya i will like it here. i love the ppl. you have no idea. i would love for you and dad to come here.

my area covers the ward aquiry and the branch conquista Latitude: 8° 45' 0 S, Longitude: 67° 22' 0 W north of Rio Blanco about 30 minutes by bus, but a neighborhood of rio blanco.

Till next week! Love ya!!!

About Acre

2009-05-23T20:11:00.000-07:00

The State of Acre is almost entirely covered by the Amazon forest. With an area of about 150,000 km2, Acre is twice as big as Austria, and nearly the same size as Illinois. The name Acre derived from the indian word Aquiri, which would mean "river of caymans".Half of the population lives in the capital, Rio Branco; this name means White River, a tribute to the Barão do Rio Branco, a Brazilian diplomat who in the early 1900s signed the Treaty of Petrópolis, by which Brazil and Bolívia agreed on the definitive borders. Other relevant cities are, by population, Cruzeiro do Sul and Sena Madureira; the city of Xapuri, despite of being small, became famous after environmentalist Chico Mendes was murdered there in 1988.All large cities of Acre were built by the banks of rivers, which are the main means of transportation of the State; the access to smaller communities, distant from the large rivers, is via igapós, kind of small channels which connect the large rivers.The Economy of Acre is based on cattle raising, agriculture and, mostly, extrativism of the rubber trees; these trees are called "seringueiras" in Portuguese, the people who do the hard work are called "seringueiros" (Chico Mendes was leader of a union of seringueiros), and the people who profit from the work are called "seringalistas". Marina Silva, the Minister of Environment (2004), was an ex-seringueira, who worked alongside Chico Mendes.Acre is one of the most environment conscious States of Brazil; the idea of sustainable development is behind all the actions of the government. However, the State has been suffering from the action of timber smugglers and illegal farmers, who burn down the jungle to clear space for the cattle.

TRANSFER!!!!

2009-05-23T20:08:00.000-07:00

yo yo. ya this week was way short haha. i have no cool stories cause i just emailed you friday. but lets see... I WAS TRANSFERED...right now im still in my first area but tonight i grab a bus to my new area.....guess where.....yup ACRE. its the state farthest north of the mission. it will be alot like the amozons. it will be awsome. you can look up "acre" and read about it and stuff. i believe the city i will be in is the capital "rio branco" but im stocked. i get a bus tonight for there. a 36 hour bus ride. ya for me.. haha. i will prob die on a 36 hour bus ride in brasil haha. jkjkjk. E. orr was in acre for his whole mission to. me and him were both in our first areas until this transfer. he left acre when i go to acre. haha. how great huh. well i will see him someday haha. well love ya.

Baptism!

2009-05-15T09:34:00.000-07:00

baptism L-R. wellington, ullisius, me, jenifer, glauber, vauldarine, elder maraesother photo we made brownies and bought icecream. it was good.

so this week was busy but not with alot of teaching, it was more of conferances and practices and interviews with pres. it was pretty intese. he said since he leaves in a month he is teaching us everything so is clothes are clean from our blood in the last days haha. he is a funny guy. but it was a day and a half of this stuff. he taught ALOT of deep doctrine stuff. it was awesome. he even got into deep doctrine with marrige. holy its like totally trunky haha. jkjk. but im kinda scared to get married. did you know if you get divorced the 1st pres. wont even look at your name for at least 15 yrs to be called to be a bishop. WOW. i didnt know that. but all is well here. love ya.

News from Cuiaba April 29th, 2009

2009-04-29T08:29:00.000-07:00

This is sooooooooo gross! Elder Stanger's roommates toe!

This is the gross toe roommate! Elder Onoles

Valdarane and her family are doing good. The little boy is doing good. He wanted to bare his testimony this last sunday and asked me to write it down for him cause he didnt know what to say so i wrote some things and he got up there and read it and then kept on going for a little. haha I was impressed cause he said more then i wrote. All is well here!!!

We are teaching ppl but nothing way firm yet. We are working on the daughter of valdarenes husband. she is 12 years, she accepted for the 10th but its not a firm date. last night we told her to pray and stuff so well find out more tonight. We're workin lots on a plan for the ward. We're trying to make plans for this ward to get more excited.

Family Baptism!

2009-04-15T08:34:00.001-07:00

left to right: Diego, Elder Moraes, Rubia, Junior, Elder Stanger, Rogeney
so this week we baptized that family we have been teaching. the family where just the brothers and sisters live together. i had to baptize Diego twice cause that little pool we have is a little harder to get the whole body under the water haha. it was funny. i love that family they are so humble and loving. they are really an amazing family. i got your new catolog. its amazing, way bigger then when i left haha. and i like the name of the product cuiaba haha. thats funny.

2009-04-08T09:29:00.000-07:00

New Photos:
When it rains... we walk! Just an idea as the the amount of water we walk in. When I say we walk in a foot of water... I am serious!

A family we had lunch with before conference and they had rice, beans, and "LASANGA"!!! haha. we were just really happy it was something other then rice and beans for once haha. and bananas of course. but thats not to weird. there are banana trees everywhere.

2009-04-08T08:35:00.000-07:00

so guess what? i didnt get transfered haha. still in the same area. anderson moved. i dont know where he is. and that family of kids are doin great. they LOVED conference, as did i. especially the one about member missionaries finding ppl for us fulltimers to teach. that was a GREAT talk. they're doing great! yesterday we taught the word of wisdom and law of chasity. just think a bunch of kids living without parents. ya i thougth it would be scary. they accepted the law of chasity like it was nothing and the only thing they had a problem with in the word of wisdom was coffee but they said they would stop and let us get rid of it for them. Juinor, the oldest, 24, got his wisdom teeth pulled so he is not in the picture, he was in the other room with the baby. he is an amazing young man.

March 25th

2009-03-25T09:26:00.000-07:00

Our baptism this week: name is Rosária, we found her cause her neighbor was a reference so we went there and the neighbor wasn't home so we were like lets ask this neighbor what the schedule is so we know when to come back. when we clapped at the neighbors house she was like o come in so we went in. she said she had a REALLY hard week and the night before she made a prayer and was really sincere and prayed for heavenly father to show her what she needs to do because the path she was on was not going well. and then the next day we clapped at her door. so she heard the first lesson and said she will be prepare for baptism. she had lots of problems with the law of chasity and with the word of wisdom. she smoked, drank alcohol and tea, drank coffee, 4 out of the 5 things she did have a problem with. we taught she cant drink coffee anymore and she was like i can somewhat understand why i cant smoke or drink alcohol but coffee and tea i dont understand. but o well. i dont have to understand. i believe this is an answer to my prayer so i will obey. we would mark a chapter for her to read and when we came back she would have read like 5 chapters. haha. she was eating the BOM up haha. but she TOTALLY MOVED her life in two weeks and was baptised. she says she doesnt understang alot of things yet but she has LOTS of faith and jsut does what she is told haha. she is cool.

This week in review:(MUST READ THIS)

here is this weeks stuff.

Font:

we got a pool put in the front of the chapel to do baptisms now. its right next to the podium haha. but this week we set the pool up and then spent 2 hours carring buckets of water through the chapel haha. it was great fun.

Singing:at her baptism us four missionaries did a musical number and sang. it was fun.

Locked in Bathroom:this week also we were teaching some investigators and i had to use the restroom so i went but when i was done i couldnt unlock the door haha. it was embarrising, the son, waiting to take a shower, had to climb through the window in just his towel haha. but he unlocked it for me .

Believer:also this week we were in the street and a lady (beleiver) came up to us in the middle of the road and started dancing and singing annd screaming stuff about god. it was weird haha. everyone was staring at us.

Valdarane's Husband:(the mom of the little girl that died) we're starting to teach Valdarane´s husband, he has knowen about the chruch since 1995 but never accepted the missionares to "teach" him, they could just converse whti him. but now he accepted us to teach him. he has lots of doubts and questions but he is keeping his commitments. :) o when we were at valdaranes house we grabbed the BOM we gave them to mark a chapter for them to read and the chapter wasnt in the book. come to find out its missing lots of chapters and athe books are in a weird order. haha. we gave them a new one and i kept that one for memories. (note: the family moved closer to Hyrum's house)

Teaching a family:last night we taught a family for the first time. well its just brothers and sisters that live in the house. the oldest is 24. their mom died 4 yrs ago and the dad got married and left so there all alone. but it was the most spiritual lesson of my mission. we talked about eternal families and the plan of salvation and we were all in tears. I pray they continute to accept the comitments and are baptized.

Week in Review

2009-03-18T09:09:00.000-07:00

but this week that lady we were looking for we never found until satuday and we just got a hold of her on the phone and she was like "im not going to be baptized". we dont even know where she is. we havnt seen her yet. but then we had another baptism scheduled for this last sunday. Everton, he is 19 and sunday mornign was the interveiw and he still had a couple problems so we remarked for next sunday. we were there at his house 30 min before church and planned everything for him to go to chruch wiht his neighbor (member) it was all planned good. the member showed up at chruch without him and said after we left he left with his girlfriend. and she was the problems for the baptism. so that one fell thruough to. he didnt really want it he just wouldnt tell us the truth. Anderson the 26 yr old we baptised like 3 weeks ago recieved the priesthood this last suday. that was way exciting. the lady we encontered from going to her neighbors house is progressing ALOT she will be baptized this sunday! we taught the word of wisdom a couple days ago and she had a problem with smoking, drinking, coffee, and tea. 4 out of the 5 things. but she said after the first day we showed up at her house she stopped smoking and drinking. coffee and tea were here only to problems yet. she said she didnt understang exactly why we cant drink those to but if its a comandment she will keep it and so we dumped all her coffee down the sink. fun fun. haha. but that is about this week. maybe waydes pray was for comfort because the last two sundays our baptisms have fallen. but i am VERY thankful for my family and the GREAT love they all have for me. and the GREAT support you are all for me. love ya.

Lost Woman

2009-03-16T07:36:00.000-07:00

so this week lets see...we had a baptism marked for sunday and the women (Mariléia) was really nervous. we explained everything and she seemed fine after a while.
so we're in church. after chuch we are talking with member organizing everything and getting rides and stuff and we turn around and she is gone. haha. we dont know where she went. we called the family she came with and they didnt know. we couldnt find her so there was no baptism.
well yesterday we went to where she works and she didnt show up to work. so we walked to her house and her parents didn't know where she was. so i dont know what were going to do. we still dont know where she is. i pray we find her so she can get baptized sunday.

monday we were contacting references we got and one of them wasnt home so we were like, lets aske the neighbor if she knows when they will get back and stuff. so we "clapped" at the neighbors door and she invited us in and come to find out the day before she was having a REALLY hard time and she said a prayer for like the first time in her life asking what she can do to move her life. then she says the next day you two knock at me door. she said she has practicaly no faith and doesnt even know if she believes in all this religion stuff but because of this "sign" she wil take our lessons and try her hardest to understand and believe.
we told her just keep the commitments and pray lots and listen to our messages and let the lord do the rest. but ya thats pretty much this week.

Photos from December '08- February '09

2009-03-04T17:03:00.001-08:00

Ok... either a tiny lizard or a giant bacteria

First Christmas... Did you seriously eat the gingerbread house?

Missionary Sunburn! Ouch!!!!

Burning of the tie!

2009-03-04T16:56:00.000-08:00

I made 6 months and I burnt a tie. was great fun haha. weird also.
Elder De Ângelo had his last day Sunday then we packed his bags monday mornign and headed for the office. he left from there and i just hung out with the office elders all day monday and all day tuesday. Tuesday evening we found out about transfers. my new comp is coming from Acre, its the very north of our mission, so tuesday night or wednesday morning he got on a bus and the bus ride is 36 hours long. so all day wednesday i hung out with the elders in the office also. great fun haha. and i think i will be with them in the office for part of tomorrow to (thursday). we had new elders arive this week to and that is part of the reason why i dont have pday today cause im in the office and everyone is busy getting the stuff ready for the new elders. but ya that is about my week. was great. my new comps name is Elder Moraes. thats all i know about him haha. i dont know where he is from or anything. He is brazilian. but thats all i know. I will meet him tomorrow I think.

Best & Worst Week (very, very sad)

2009-02-25T06:53:00.000-08:00

Well this week i would have to say was one of the best weeks of my mission up to sunday night. monday gets here and it became the worst week of probably my whole mission for the next two years. i will start with the good news. the young man we have been teaching, anderson, we continued to teach and he stopped smoking! it was an answer to prayers. he started when he was 11 and he is 26 now and he smoked lots for a while but the last few years he had been minamizing how much he smoked and when we started to teach him he continued trying, well he went to the church last sunday and said he wanted baptized so during the week we taught him more so he could and he comitted to stop smoking and we helped him and he stopped and this sunday he was baptized!!! it was awesome! a member in the ward baptized him, which is good because now he has a friend in the ward that wont get transfered. but it was great still becasue we taught him and helped him to be baptized so it was great to see success and have a baptism cause it had been a while without one. the same night the other elders in our area had 2 baptisms, Enrique and Solang, Enrique asked the other elders how many baptisms they had and the told him, it was a high number casue ther older in the mission, then he turned to me and was like how about you, i said one but i will have more with time casue im still new. and he was like ok i want you to baptize me. haha. i didnt even really know the kid haha. i had only seen him like once or twice before and heard aobut him in our house haha. so i ended up baptising him and his sister. haha. it was way excited sundya to have our investigator baptized and then to be able to baptize two others!!! great day and week. Monday gets here and were teaching and we recieve a phone call. remember my first baptism Waldarina, wel her daughter Valdarane, the one who has had all the health problems and been in the hospital for 4 months on and off, well finally all is better for her and she gets home. the phone call we found out there was a bad accident. her husband is a police oficer and her son was playing with a gun of his and accidently shot is sister. in the picture the you can see the son and daughter. there is only one son and the daughter is the youngest. he is 10 and she was 6. it was so sad. i love that family and they were one of the first families i met in the mission. she was shot in the back of the head and died. we went to the hospital to comfort them and help. it was so sad. tuesday was the viewing, it really is hard. i love that family. i pray for them soo much now. the son is so confused and scared, it was an accident. the mom is just overloaded with every problem in the world now. her health and then this. but its sad. but i guess look at the bright side. the Plan of Salvation! I know that this helps that family a ton becasue the dad of the girl is not a member and the funeral was in his church and...well...wow...it was OUT OF CONTROLL. Valdarene was calm and stuff but ppl who werent even family were going crazy, ppl were screaming over the little girls body and ready scriptures way loud and singing songs loud and just out of control. Valdarane is a VERY strong women to be able to stay strong during all of this with her health problems to. ive never met someone like her. she is always just smiling and making the best out of what she has. it just doesnt seem real. a day or two before this we were at her house and glauber the son and the little girl victoria were painting a little wood box for there toys. she was painting it pink on the inside. this is what i remember every time i think about her now. its soo sad. she looked so pretty. she had a little white casket. ill miss her
i know its still not the same for you all because you didnt know them. but they are family to me and it is real. we always think this coundln't happen to my family. but STOP thinking that. make sure EVERY gun in our house and everyones house is locked up GOOD. and just a piece of advice dont buy toy guns for kids. what a gross toy, a gun, seriously. what is the point.

The BEST Family

2009-02-21T20:07:00.000-08:00

I studied 1 nephi 17 this week! I love it when Nephi chastises his brothers saying you know this and that vs 25-29. I marked when he said 'you know'. His brothers knew ALOT but still wouldn't believe. It reminds me of the General Conference talk "You know enough". We really do know enough. Sometimes we get doubts and our testimony is tested... but we just need to think back and see all the Lord has done for us. It's easy for me cause i ahve a ton of blessings. An absolutely amazing family.
the other day the Elders were talking about the richest elder in the mission... the elder with the most baptisms... the elder with the best this... or that... And guess what? The Elder with the best family? They all said it was ME! It is soooooooo true! Love you all

A note from mom: Have you written your brother lately?

Visit from Elder Cook

2009-02-21T20:00:00.000-08:00

Elder Cook is coming to Cuiaba! He will talk to the members on the 28th of January and to the Elders on the 29th. Everyone is sooooooo excited to hear and meet an Apostle. I didn't realize how much I took advantage of that at home. They asked if I'd ever heard or seen an Apostle and I told them I'd been to conference before. It wasn't way wired to me but when they heard this, they nearly died!
They took a bus trip from Cuiaba to the temple. The colset temple is in Sao Paulo and it is a 24 hour bus ride. Some people spend a year building up and saving for this. They sell all they have to go. Literally all they have. When they get back, they start over and in a year they will do the same. They are so humble and excited to make this annual trip to the temple.
Interesting Note from Mom: We rode in the same plane as Elder Cook. We were on our way to vacation and he was headed to Brazil. There were lots of new missionaries just leaving to their mission on the same plane and they were taking pictures with Elder Cook, so we did not want to bother him. We later found out that was where he was going and wished we had talked to him and had him give Elder Stanger a hug from his mom!

New Year

2009-02-21T19:52:00.000-08:00

Happy new Year! New goals, new life. New everything for me this year! I will be a missionary for the entire year of 2009. How lucky am I? This will be one of the best years of my entire life. This whole year, every second this year, I am the Lord's Servant. This will be the only year in my life to be the Lords servent for every second. It's exciting!
Thanks for the letters. I love getting letters!
The spirit is so strong. I finished the Book of Mormon a few weeks ago. It was fabulous. I've recently started over. I love Nephi and the faith he has. First they travel and leave everything they have to live in tents. Then they have to travedl back to the most powerful man and almost get killed a few times. Then travel back to tents. Then travel to tell another family to leave all they have to marry them and live in tents AND go to a land that no one knows exists. That's the faith I want!!!! I love readin the book of Mormon. It is so amazing to me.

Busy Week!

2009-02-18T07:33:00.000-08:00

We had a time change this week. its 11:15 here now. This week: the bishop did us a huge favor and drove us around for almost 4 hours to show us our area because we weren't having success where we were working. Come to find out our area is HUGE. There is like 150,000 ppl that live just in our prosyliting area. He showed us areas that have never been worked by missionaries yet. and of course they are WAY far away, but its a sacrifice were doing for success. Speaking of success we're having lots more. He showed us the area friday, saturday we walked there and knocked doors to find investigators. Sunday we had a group of ppl show up to church and one of them, Anderson, said he wanted baptized, out of the blue, so that is WAY exciting. Were having lots more success now so its worth the LONG walks. Anderson has a couple problems with the word of wisdom were trying to help him with, lots of praying and fasting. We're hoping that we can baptize him this Sunday. He is 26 yrs old. We have others to we're teaching and stuff also but he is the only one for this sunday. We will invite a couple more for this Sunday to to see if they except. Also the last week of this month is the largest holiday in Brasil called Carnival, lots of drinking and partying. so were not excited for this. Its hard on investigators to tell them they can't do all of that but with faith they will stay stong. Also this week we found out who our new president will be in july. Pres. Oliveira. he is from Recife Brasil and he has been a stake pres already. He is a bishop now and he has had other callings. so that is exciting. We got rain all this week. I love it. It's less hot when it rains but also we're soaked all day from walking in it. haha. There are good things and bad things about everything.
Spider in water!
I was givin a cup of water at a house with spider webs and a dead spider in it. I politly asked for a different one. haha. There is always stuff floating in the water but a spider was a little much for me. Another weird thing i haven't mentioned yet that is hard for me... everyone uses the same cup haha. its weird.

Hot!

2009-02-18T06:45:00.000-08:00

So the most exciting thing that happened this week was when we were proselyting! As we were walking my shirt burst into flames from the extreme heat! Crazy huh? I took a picture with the thermometer at 120 degrees and then another one where it was so hot, the thermometer just said 'error'.
I am growing to love the people here. People here are all nice. Everyone is nice, even the non-members.
Weather is hot, but it is way pretty. So much green. Fruit Trees everywhere.
Your support is very much appreciated. My wieght... well I think it is ok. The scales are not in pounds, so not sure how much I weigh. I know I gained 10 lbs in the CTM... shhhh don't tell anyone!

Elder Stanger's Zone

2009-02-11T05:39:00.002-08:00

This is Hyrum's Zone. The Lady in blue/ the man next to her is an area seventy, Elder Tobias and his wife. Next to him is Prez and Sister Milder and standing next to Elder Hyrum is his comp, Elder De ângelo from Sao Paulo(red tie). He will get a new mission Prez in July. (They are in the back row towards the left)

funny story this week.

2009-02-11T05:39:00.001-08:00

well lets see. yesterday we were walking down the side of the road and there is a sharp corner in the road right. well imagin those REALLY OLD trucks you see in the movies filmed in mexico and stuff. like REALLY OLD trucks haha. well this truck was taking this corner WAY fast and the passenger door swung open and the passenger like almost fell out. he like grabbed on to the door and was like doing a superman on the corner. it was way scary but way funny. he almost hit me. haha. if he let go i would have been there to catch him. but it was way crazy. it reminded me of a movie haha. also we got a bus for one of the lunches at a members this week that lives far away and this buss was like a theme park ride. haha. off road in the dirt. way bumpy like driving through the rain forest haha. it was a crazy "ride" haha. fun though.

A typical day

2009-02-04T12:09:00.000-08:00

typical day. 6:30-7:00 pray exercise.
7:00-7:30 shower get ready (4 ppl 1 bathroom)
7:30-8:00 breakfast 8:00-9:00 personal study (BOM first, then Preach my Gospel, then other church stuff we want to study. i study D&C and mathew)
9:00-10:00 comp study(practice and prepare for lessons that day)
10:00-11:00 language study.
11:00_12:00 work
12:00-1:00 lunch at a members
1:00-9:30 work (walk, teach, walk, teach) we get an hour of dinner before 6:00.
9:30-10:00 plan for the next day.
10:00-10:30 write in jounal, shower, pray.
10:30 lights out

Are you Homesick?

2009-02-04T12:06:00.001-08:00

im not homesick. i just think about home. but its not homesick. its just normal. haha. its hard to explain. but dont worry about me. im great. and the 3 kids that were supposed to be baptized..., well no. they back out the sunday of there baptism because ppl told them weird stuff about our chruch that wasnt true and we explained and answered there ?s but it was to late. they were like nope. so it was sad cause we were way excited for them to be baptized that day. but we got a couple new ones now. we knocked doors (clapped hands) on the houses around ours and found a family that we think will be really good. never been taught and her house is in front of ours. weird. but we only taught once and it was short. we didnt have much time. but she talked lots and seemed really interested. so we marked for friday. but its all going good. monday we walked to the bishops house. he lives WAY far away. like an hour to walk there (and we walk WAY fast) and we got there and no one was home so we had to walk back. it was GREAT. haha. its weird. thats the bishop. but the church is much newer here. haha. LOTS is different. still TRUE. just different. i LOVE the stuff im learning. haha. i always thought our church was so confound and dificult to learn. but wow, really its simple. the basics really are all we need. and ive learned the basics here alot more. i still have ltos to learn but when elder cook talked to the cuiaba stake everyone one here was soo excited to hear an apostle thinking of all he would do and guess what he talked about. strengthen families. family home evening, pray, scripture study. thats all he talked about. its true. the basics we need to strengthen more.

CTM photos

2008-12-31T07:35:00.001-08:00

Love of Family & Christ, Merry Christmas

2008-12-24T07:33:00.000-08:00

hey mom. so this last week not a lot happend out the ordinary aha. just> alot of trunky and stuff. haah. but thats normal right. its christmas. nothing i cant handle so dont worry. your prayers are greatly appreiciated. everyday i find another reason why the lord sent me here. i would die if i was in the states where ppl decorated for christmas. its not bad here> cause it doesnt seem like christmas.. our house is the only house in cuiaba with christmas presents and decorations. but tonigh we have a party with a recent convert. we all bought presents for the kids. and tomorrow night we have a chirstmas party at my recent converts. i cant wait. we bought those kids presents to. im sooo excited to see there faces when they see they have presents for chirstmas. they are soo cute.. one of the litlle girls always grabs my hand when were walking in the streets and im like no you cant do that sorry. its sad cause there just soo innocent and happy and have nothing. we are so spoiled in our family. not just with objects but just my family alone. im soo thankful for my family. i have an awesome support. i have like billions of letters and presents. i thank the lord all the time for my family. ive love reading the christmas stories and reading about christ. what a great time of year. i love giving presents to these ppl. i wish i was a millionare so i could just buy them all presents. there so happy with anything they get. ill prob give most of the presents i get to them to. and no im not saying i wont like my presents its just that if they could use them and it would make them sooo happy i might give some away. but ya....i love you thanks for everything. take lots of pics during chirstmas ok. thanks love you

A conversation in Portuguese

2008-12-10T08:06:00.000-08:00

mom: Você pode escrever-me algo no português?(write me something in Portuguese)
Hyrum: o que você quer (what do you want)
Mom:Pergunte-me algo!(ask me something)

End of conversation!

1st Baptism

2008-12-10T07:00:00.000-08:00

i had my first baptism..it was awesome.. she was confirmed also...so thats exciting...she just absolutly loves the church and everything about it....and ya its that family with the lady that was almost dying...but she is all better now i think..she went to a new doctor and he fixed her up. and she is way strong. her daughter and grandson are members so it counted as a family baptism so that was awesome.

Did you do the baptizing? ya i did it!

Photos: elder mason and me and the boy is glauber the one im baptising is waldirina and the her daughter is valderine and i dont know the two girls names. baptized sat...i think it was the 6th

1st Testimony

2008-12-10T06:56:00.000-08:00

It rained a couple times this week. last week we had to shower using a bucket. but ya its awesome...the language is getting a little better...i know like 5 words now...haha..jk..sunday i bore my testimony and the other elders there were like i just wittnesed the gift of tongues elder..you spoke perfect..it was amazing...haha...so that was cool...

Butterfly Funeral

2008-11-26T06:39:00.000-08:00

We taught a family of like 6 i think in a house smaller then annies room...just one room the whole house..they had a sheet hanging from the wall to kind of seperate the visiting area from the kithcen bedroom and bathroom...there was a tree branch growing through one of the walls and then a huge butterfly flying around..haha..it flew into the fan during the prayer and that was then end of him.haha

First letters from the field

2008-11-17T20:22:00.000-08:00

Mom, Thanks for the letter! It is good to hear Josh is doing well. I have to tell you your letter was awesome this week. I got your letter the 3rd day in the field and that was my first full day. Now being my first full day you can imagine everything going through my mind! Ok, never mind... I don't think you can imagine... it was a lot. But lets just say your letter could not have been better timing. The first day was sooooooooo hard! Hot, different language, living conditions, hot, hot, walingk, hot and more hot, and lots more walking. But I'm not complaining. Ive really learned to enjoy myself in these conditions. I've found no matter how bad a day can go, I can always find positives. For example... yesterday (Oct 28th) Everything went.... well shall I say not so good? First we walked 1 1/2 mile to a bank to get money, but the machine was broken, so we walked another mile to another one. Then we took the bus to teach a 16 year old boy and he didn't accept the lesson as we had hoped. So the day went on. That night for dinner we started to walk to the members house and it started to rain and we don't have umbrellas and we don't have time to get them either. So we walk 3 to 4 more miles in the rain and we can't find the house. We use a pay phone to call the Elders.. come to find out we walked the wrong direction. We bought drinks for dinner but by now the bags had dissappeared. We turned to walk back 3 miles to the house. After dinner we had to hurry cause we had gotten to dinner late so we had little time to get back to our house by 9:30. We decided to take a bus cause it was 8:50 and we had like 5 miles to go. So we got on the bus for like 5 minutes and realize we were on the wrong bus.. OOpsie! So we get off and SPEED WALK in 100 * weather back to our house. We got back at 9:35 so not to late! But looking at this day you can't help but wonder... what went well, what was good? Honestly, not alot went good, but I've learned somwhat how to find good in all things. For example, it was fun to walk in the rain soaked wet! We got to know our area better. Dinner was GReat! Ya just some of the little things but the little things help keep me going! It was fun to walk in the rain while we laughed at our stupid mistakes of directions. I've enjoyed everyday, so far after that 1st one. It was tough! I said a prayer and after that it just got easier. So just so you know, I still LOVE it here. I LOVE life. All is well! I love you and hope all is well. Love Elder Stanger

Mom's List of Questions....:)

2008-11-12T11:17:00.000-08:00

1.Where do you go for a computer? for computer i go to the office normally or to like a coffee shop thingy
2.Do you meet in a church building? our church building is getting remodled so were in like a warehouse right now
3.Tell me about any families or people you work with. in the letter i will send today i talk about one family-its a new area so were still trying to work to get ppl
4.do you track or do you have appointments? we track and have appointments-mostly appointments
5.Tell me about your comp?my comp, elder mason, he is from cali, he is loaded rich(more details.. just ask mom)
6. Can you use your debit card?ya i can use my debit card, im going to try not to though as much as poss,
7. Are you in a poor part?yes, very poor, all of our mission is poor i think
8. Is there a ward or branch? i dont know if its a ward or a branch-its weird, but my area is the hardest in the mission i guess cause only half has been open for missionaries and elder mason and i are opening the other half-its hard but fun
9.Do you eat at peoples houses? lunch everday is in a members home
10. Do you still eat beans and rice and now FISH?ya-every meal beans rice and tomatoes, ive eaten fish once...YUCK
11. Are there misquiotoes? Bugs? Snakes? not really alot of bugs, a few but its just so dang hot,
12. Do you ride buses? ya ride busses and walk, LOTS
13. Is youre bed comfortable? of course my bed is comfortable. its a 100 year old mattress on the ground haha
14. Are the Brazil testimonies strong? the ones who belive in the church have strong testimonies, there are some weak to, just like in the states
15. Do you work with teenagers? ya work with whoever wants to hear the messages
16. Tell me about the toilet the toilet is under the shower-its a weird setup-Grandpa wouldnt not approve-i took pics,
17. the carpet? NO carpet-tile and concrete
18. The kitchen sink? not much of a kitchen at all, ive got pics
19. Is this new area very poor? (already answered above)
20. Did the dog break your skin when he bit? no the dog didnt break skin, it was really nothing, i just told you to scare you, it mainly just got my pants. DONT WORRY
21. Are the rats on the streets? no rats on the streets,
22. Do children beg for money, food?no children begging
23. Do vendors sell on the street like in Mexico? ya ppl sell stuff on the streets!

there are fruit trees EVERYWHERE like every 10 feet there is a mango tree, pomagranite tree, caju tree, any kind or fruit you can think of plus more that you have never heard of, and
ok ok...from now on becasue of time, write down your questions and only send 5 at a time ok...haha love you

November 3rd Email

2008-11-05T08:45:00.000-08:00

well....come to find out....the area im in my comp and i are opening it...haha....
its his first time as senior/trainer and my first area and were opening it..haha....
so ya..its a great fun experience....im loveing it....
highlight of the week...um...an hour walk to a no show....:)..that was fun...
i absolutly love it here....i thank the lord daily cause it doesnt make sense...
the heat
the livving conditions
the hard work...
it just doesnt make sense that i would love it but i do....im having soooo much fun....its great....
we sing in the streets and stuff..haha...were loosers...um...
everyone loves to hear me pray and teach cuz i dont know the language well haha..
so i do alot of praying and teaching....
all the kids here are soooo cute...they also LOVE to help me learn...
they get picture books and ask what this and that is....theere great helps...
way cute though for sure...
i want to just hold and hug them...but i cant....um...all is well....love you

Paul's Surgery

2008-10-30T19:28:00.000-07:00

No it's not Hyrum but it's his big brother. It's a video of Paul when he first came out of surgery. We got a kick out of it and thought we would post it.

1st Email from Cuiaba

2008-10-30T15:16:00.000-07:00

mom...way to go losing your phone....well the first week went by alot faster then i thought it would...its all been good...
the first day was hard...i got a little depressed you could say...
i realized i dont speak or understand anything and the living conditions...well different...
food....ya..anyway...
not to mention the tempature is 130 everyday i swear...
haha...
but i prayed and since then ive been good....
lets see some of the highlights of the first week.....
i sweat ALOT....
i got bitten by a dog....not bad but it got me...
um WALK LOTS...
the house...haha...
if you can call it that is LOADED with STDS....haha...
its sooo gross....wow do i appriciate my house at home now...haah....
its like i dont know...bad...
i LOVE it...its all a really fun experience...
the fruit is awesome...mango straight of the tree...mmm mmm good....
all is well though...
how was new york....
how is paul...
whats up with all the head injuries latly...jeez this is bad...i would like everyone to be alive when i get home please...
sunday at church i was talking to a guy...and come to find out one of his companions on his mission was ryan bevan...sarah bevans older brother...crazy huh?
here is my new address
Elder hyrum stanger
CX. Postal10264
Cuiabá-MT
78050-975
Brazil
so you can write me at that address...spread the word...o and as soon as you get this you should call grandma and tell her to not send me money anymore....NO one send me money anymore ok...thanks...if anyone wants to send me money just have them put it in my account or something ok....thanks....
at a fireside one of our leaders brought their 18 month old little girl. i wanted to hug her and hold her so bad, but not for 2 years... haha
i love everyone! give them a hug!

Email October 21st, '08

2008-10-22T11:25:00.000-07:00

so wednesday the 15th was an AWESOME day for sure....you know how i told you we got our move date moved to the 30th...well guess what? wednesday they moved it again to the 22nd....thats tomorrow....wow huh..=..im soo excited...we leave in the mornig to the airport and off to cuiaba a whole week early...i cant wait.....thursday is the brazilians p-day so they went to the temple early....and all of us americans in my room =were in showering and the brazies in our room locked the door when they left...all we had were our towels so we couldnt go get help. we just had to wait like 15 min and a maintanance guy finally let us in.=....fri. we went proselyting again...way fun....there was some crazy parade thing going on.....ppl dressed way....WEIRD...crossdressers and ppl like naked pretty much and everyone was drunk out of there minds so it was hard to talk to ppl but it was still a fun. good experience...sat we set our clocks 1 hour ahead...so we lost an hour of sleep...but it hasnt really affected me...im glad i farmed and pretended to work at home....its made it alot easier for me out here....remind me to make my kids work ok...thanks... sunday i found out Elder Scott and Elder Anderson are coming to speak to us saturday....to bad i leave a week early now huh...i am going to miss them by like 3 days...so that is kinda dissapointing but im still excited to get out into the field for sure...a good quote i heard sunday in a talk was....I have two years to serve the lord and eternity to think about it.....it just made me think to myself....STOP THINKING AND DO!!!! yesterday i read the august 30th chruch news....the twin falls temple was the highlight of it so that was cool....we also had all of our meetings, departure meeting, health meeting, and all the fun stuff....haha....and i had gym and we were playing volleyball and i was running to get the ball and i slipped on water and slid into the wall...OUCH...i hit my knee and toes full speed into the wall....it hurts to kneel and pray now...and walk...and everything else...haha....it broke part of my toenail off and jammed it into my skin and stuff....its pretty gross..haha....but fun story....!!!well that is pretty much my week....were going to eat at rodigeose here soon since its our last p-day....were going with Irm Qurrino....he is cool....love you all. bye for now. Elder Hyrum

Elder Stanger and Miguel

2008-10-20T15:46:00.000-07:00

Hyrum got to see Miguel, our old foreign exchange student from Brazil. Here is a picture of them.

Letter written to mom october 2

2008-10-20T11:45:00.000-07:00

wow so much to talk about in this letter. first off i hope my handwriting is getting better so you can read the letters i write you!:) secondly, this week had been great! for a # of reasons. i hope you did not read dads letter cause if you did this letter is a waste of my time :) they will say pretty much the same thing. ill start at the beginning and work my way forward. Tuesday Sep. 30th elder Orr marked a verse in my scriptures for me. its totally appropriate for me:) D&C 23:3. its a good one. Wednesday was the first thunder storm, very pretty. very loud. very
EVERYWHERE! its crazy! we gave out 6 copies of the books of mormon. i also got 3 packages; 2 from mom and 1 from amanda. the one from mom was tie and cookies. the other was snacks and supplies. i was very surprised you bought shampoo. why did you not send me yours? But OK! we loved all 3 packages. thank you so much. couldn't have gotten better. it was also conference this weekend. it was so nice to hear the messages taught! some talks that stood out to me were: well pretty much ALL of them. Pres. Monson announced a temple in ITALY! I am so happy for dad. It was weird normally conference is SOOO LONG, but this time it was WAY short! I'm sad. It was AMAZING it was all directed straight to me, i think :) lots of missionary talk and brazil talk :) well my favorite talk saturday was Jeffrey R. Hollands! i will let you either watch it again or read it if you want. but i loved it. you and dad are mortal angels. always there for me in my good and bad times. you always supported me and loved me! thank you so much! grandma and grandpa are also angels. they always gave me good supportive talks and stories. each one of my brothers and sisters are also. they are all so loving to me even when i was just rude. my nieces and nephews are also, always reminding me to become as a child. :) you and dad especially! i could point out specific things for each one of you all, but my hand tells otherwise. the longer i write the worse it looks. i still have journal to write in! but all of conference was great for sure. priesthood session was crazy. i choir that sung for it was from the provo mtc and guess who i saw! Elder Andy Harding! it was cool to see him! but we watched all the sessions live except priesthood cause it was to late. so it got recorded and we wathced it sunday morning! mom, one more thing for you from conference. sister elains s dalton. never underestimate the influence of the righteous influence. sorry but i am going to be done talking about conference, i could talk forever on it cause it was soo amazing. but i wont :) so here are some pictures of miguel and i when we met up with each other. hope you enjoy them! well, what else to talk about? i am going to the Sao Paulo temple again tuesday! oh so i want you to know that i am very thankful for the packages from you and amanda. me, my comp, and roommates love them!! :) well i guess i can just tell you how I'm doing! i am great. i am still loving it here. i thank the lord daily for making this be easy for me. i have yet to feel homesick. sure i miss everyone but it is nothing i cant handle. its been easy overall. the gospel knowledge is growing immensely Ive learned soooo much about the Church. i love this church. there are millions are me every day! and we heard conference there are now over 1 million members in brazil! i get to make that grow by opening new places in brazil cuiaba mission! i am so excited. the language is um.... well less then fluent. i prayed the other day and said "bless our children" OOPSES, i am glad i didnt get sent home we cant have children! :) :) ya my Portuguese is very rusty. but better than it used to be before i left home. i can carry on small conversations. i love it. i love all the prayers in my behalf! they help a lot. so just know i am great and have no worries about me. guess what though! bu the time you get this letter i will only have 2 weeks in the CTM. we fly to cuiaba the 28th of october. cant wait to teach ANYONE and EVERYONE. so how is brett doing? how is devon also? i am going to write them. well i love you and thank you for everything. elder stanger
A great talk that touched me and let me know that i have a testimony of this gospel was by carlos gody. "we dont have to see angels or have GREAT experiences to have a testimony" i now realize i do have a strong enough testimony. it was a good talk for me. well dont worry about me ok! :) :) is there anything i need to pray for at home specifically?
love you elder stanger

letter to mom on sept 30th

2008-10-13T18:32:00.000-07:00

mom, i got the package with the tie in it. i love the tie, tell annie good pick!! and i now know that you have a very hard time reading my letters cause i suck at writing so i'm going to take twice as long on this letter to try and mike it legible. (you can read this letter much better hand writing) . ok let me know if you can read it. i hope you can. so saturday the 27th we got to teach the 1st lesson to a brazilion family. you can only imagine hor that went. they recorded us so we could watch ourselves teach. ha ha. it was so funny. O not really. it actually went pretty well! my portugese is a little rusty i asked "how does the gospel bless your family"OOPSIE. the first lesson they are not members! but it wasstill fun. i had a hard time understanding all of their questions but it will slowly come. this sunday the 28th was fast sunday cause next week is conference! i cant wait. church is in English. they split the brazilian districts up from americans. we go to the temple weekly. Sao Paulo on the 30th it is a beautiful temple inside temple session are in english. i really do love the tie idea. i figure ill get about 24 ties right. well 23 left and i should be getting tie #2 this month soon. send it to the feild. i think as long as 24 months is it will go fast. one month is already done and i just got here yesterday. so i also go the letter about rethas labor. sounds intense. how is she doing? she will be a great mom. ryan he will be a fun dad. when the baby is two i will be home!! lets not look at it that way. ha ha.

really i am loving it here. the spirit is so strong. sundays are amazing. i bore my testimony on prayer sunday. it is so crazy. the spirit is goin gto kill me sometimes i think cause its SOOO STRONG. one of pauls letters he wrote "pray to god like he is standing right in front of you cause he is". those lines hit deep in me. as you know i wasnt the best at praying, but since i have been here i have been praying LOTS and studying LOTS. i have started to learn how to pray.i can feel the lord right in front of me. ive learned to talk with him not at him. i can literally feel his pressence in my life. im almost mad at myself. ive had all of this my whole life and never enjoyed the fulness of the gospel. ive never been more happy than i am now!! i love to think that i am so close to my savior. i am all his for two years. i amd so happy. "i am all about service". that has never been more true then now. i hope i am this happy when i get home. i am going to be sad when it is over. it just started but i can tell now it will be to short.

hows the twin falls temple? i made some mission goals. tell me if they are good or if there is anymore i should have ok.
1. be trusted by all
2. love the people
3. be someone others can count on
4. always work hard
5. follow the rules
6. no regrets
7. be happy
8. stay focused
9. serve all (dont judge).
10. do it for me and the lord
11. be a leader
how are they?

in personal study the other day i studied out alma 5. awesome chapter. christ is a stud. i love him. he is amazing. i love that chapter. anyways everything is going great. i hope you could read this letter a little better :) i tried to write better. not sure if i did though. i love you. hope all is well. i got a letter form grandma and chris jones!!! awesome week.

well i love you and thanks for everything. you are a great mom and example. you have always been a great support to me in everything i do. i appriciate it even if i dont always show it you are the best. oh i just remembered a few more things. sorry. is my cousin josh out of jail? what is up with him? how is brother Gee is he doing well? tell him hi for me. Pslams 119; 105 is also a great scripture. substitute "word" with scriptures. the scriptures are awesome i love reading them. i think that is all. i love you. love elder stanger.

i might see Miguel Tuesday afternoon. but i wont have time to write about it much. so i will probably write more next week if i dont.

you will never guess what i just saw we are on a bus ride back to the ctm from the sao paulo temple. we just drove under an over pass bridge. we just saw a pile of seadoo crates weird huh. it was like wow home. ha ha. only the guys on the side of the road were using them wisely than dad. they were taking the wood and making houses out of them. ha ha. it was crazy cool. anyways i just thought i would let you know you could make houses instead of just throwing them away. love you E stanger

joke on hyrum

2008-10-07T20:36:00.000-07:00

I fell asleep in the computer lab and they almost woke me up cause we were going back to the classroom....but then Irmão Qurino(teacher) decided to play a joke....so my district all got up and left the computer lab and they got a different district and sent them in....so the other district is in there and their teacher comes and wakes me up and is like.. elder what are you doing and where is your companion....i was like...umm....i dont know who these people are and i dont know where my comp is...they were all out in the hall laughing at me....it was embarrising...but fun....>

Letter to mom written Sept. 23

2008-10-03T13:11:00.000-07:00

Mom perfect letter this week! It lists the stuff you want to know!!! So first thing, the language. It is crazy and hard, but I don't worry to much about it because I know I will learn it. So for now I just study and pray. And your prayers are appreciated, thanks. I memorized the 1st vision this week!!! :) The shots I have to get are Hep A and B, I needed 3 of them and only did 1 at home. So I have to get 2 here. Um... Christmas Gifts you sent a package 2 weeks ago and I still don't have it so I don't know. I love the CTM. I tried some drinks, Garrdina. Good that's not how it is spelled. Beans and rice everyday. Breakfast cereal and ham and cheese sandwiches. Good job on Posergy. Keep it up!!! This week has been great. We went to the police station and had our finger prints taken. It's part of the agreement for getting visas. We went proseliting for the first time on the 19th it was amazing. Me and my comp gave out 6 Books of Mormon abd 4 out of 6 read it for like an hour long. it was awsome. it was hard to talk to them but still fun. i cant wait to start my mission in Cuiaba!!! I love it here. it is so much fun for me. i got letters from alexa, ander, sarah, dalton, and emma. so i wrote them back in this envelope. could you make an envelope and send them their letters so it looks like its from me? i am to poor to send multiple envelopes sorry. im excited to get pics of the new baby. hope all is well at home. i love you i get to go to the sao poulo temple on the 23rd it will be great!!!

letter to mom starting sept 11th

2008-10-01T09:53:00.000-07:00

mom its the 11th and i got a letter from you today. i got 6 letters today. i loved it! thats good that xtreme and posergy did good at the fair. i cant wait for a nice car when i come home. and keep praying for me. i need to learn the language asap. i got 2 more roommates today. they are brazilian. i realized i have NO idea what language they are teaching in the ctm because the brazilians speak something different. well i will write later in the week cause i am tired...today is friday the 12th. it has been a normal day for the most part. i dont know if i mentioned it but i got a letter from jataunna a couple days ago!! best day ever. today i have been working a lot on my street contact in Portuguese. we go out to the streets in a week from today. i am kinda nervous but excited at the same time. today is the best day ever for lunch. i ate so much. it was pasta. so good! so we just had classes again like normal. i did the full first lesson in English today for the last time. that was nice to get it out of the way. my comp is so funny. the lord really knows what he is doing. my comp is really short on patience if he has any at all. and since he is the district leader he conducts our meetings and stuff. but he always looses control and gets way mad. so i know i got put with him cause i am pretty easy going for the most part. i try to help him gain control and have patience. so we will so we will see if he progresses. so one of my Brazilian roommates is a black man. cool huh. i hope you got my last card and tape in good condition.

sept 13th today has been pretty good. i started to work on/plan my lesson in Portuguese. that will be kind of hard, but it will come to me. we had a fireside tonight. it was on how to give the first lesson more effortlessly. i got a lot out of it, so that was good. so no one is racest here. so our black roommate walks into the room yesterday and yells out "hey nigger cracker" it was funny. anyway love you.

sept 14th church was great. i love sundays. spirit is strong and our days are so empty so we just get to relax. it is nice. i gave the prayer in porteguesse in priesthood today. it went well i think. brazil is trying to pass a law that says NO discrimination. so if a homeosexual wants a temple recommend and the bishop says no he can get put in jail. its crazy. hope it does not pass, cause it would cause problems. we figured out that the toilets spin in the opposite way. i guess i just live on the toilet so i notice weird stuff like that. but i heard it is because we are on the opposite side of the equator. the food down here is good most the time to my tastes but my body disagrees. it punishes me about 5 times a day. NOT HEALTY :) oh well though. its worth...ya its worth it. when my journals get full do you want me to send them home so i dont have to pack them around? i have a feeling i will go through a few journals...its crazy, but lots of stories. Irmascurrino one of my instructors knows anything and everything about the gospel so we try to stump him. he always has an answer. he knows what every chapter in the quad is about. so if you have any questions tell me cause we want to stump him. ha ha. mom i got to watch ces fireside broadcast from provo...it was cool. today a sister say my name tag and was like "elder stanger ??!!" i was like "yeah" she was like "from idaho?" i said yes she said "an elder stanger from idaho served in her mission in brazil" he had a twin she said. it was weird. other than that all is well. but i am going to play a game now so i love you and talk to you soon.
sept 15th. last night my Brazilian roommate woke us up at 2:30 he thought it was 6:30! they are crazy...they dont sleep ever. i started to memorize the first vision in port today. ahhh it is so frustrating and hard. I LOVE IT:) um lets see...i am getting my hair cut tomorrow. i will send this letter tomorrow too. its p day!!! i love p day! we dont go to the temple though so that sucks. but we have a free day all day...cool huh? i email you tomorrow too. hope to know if retha had her baby and all is well with her. i am sure it is, but i cant wait to get pictures of the kid!!! so i decided elder Orr my roommate is the coolest kid ever. he reminds me of paul almost, he is fun. he is a good kid, but he gets along with everyone. he is cool. he lives in slc so thats cool. he has a gf too, so we talk alot. its so easy to stay focused here! i love it the spirit is strong. i sent part of my testimony to jatanna in a letter. you can ask her what is says if you want, but my hand is dead. but i do have a testimony. i love this church and what it does for me. i know Joseph Smith restored the church through Jesus Christ. i know that God lives and loves me. i pray like ten times a day and i know he listens. i am waiting for the answer of the gift of tongues still but i know it will come. i am so thankful for you mom and dad. i am so glad you taught me and raised me the way you did. i am thankful for the great love and support you two have for me. i hope that i can make you proud and give back even a small amount of what you have given me. you are the best. thanks for everything. i love you and the gospel. it is not just a church but its a way of life. i have realized i am not "giving up two years of my life" but i realized that the Lord is giving me two years of my life. its good. i am serving the Lord. how great is that? i mean really? the Lord. i am his servant!!!! what a great thing to be able to say and do. i love it. i love you. hope all is well. love elder stanger
p.s.keep up on doing good with posergy. i am excited for you. its cool. and how is xtreme doing? hope all is good cause i am spending all your money:)
love you dad!!!
i will email you tomorrow!!

pictures

2008-09-22T20:54:00.001-07:00

Elder Orr and Elder Stanger

Elder Wright, Elder Orr, Elder Stanger, and Elder Hayes.

Elder Hayes and Elder Stanger

Hyrum in his room

Elder Orr and Hyrum. Hyrum's bestfriend

Elder Wright and Elder Stanger

Elder Wright and Hyrum

The Sao Paulo city at night.

The city

Elder Wright and Elder Orr

The Bus ride

Elder Stanger :)

letter to dad sept 16

2008-09-19T20:12:00.000-07:00

dear dad,
the mtc is awesome so far. everything is so pretty here. i am getting along with everyone pretty well so far. my room ates are awesome. how is everything going at home? its probably just falling apart since i am not there...sorry. brazil is beautiful. it is crazy how huge the city is here. like it is never ending. but it is so colorful...so ya. i am loving it here and i know i just got here a week ago but i cant wait to learn the language and get out there to teach the people in cuiaba. i have been hearing so much about my mission and cant wait to see it for myself. love you and hope to hear from you soon.

love elder stanger

letter to mom sept 16th written sept 2

2008-09-19T20:00:00.000-07:00

i am on a bus right now. the roads are not the best here in brazil. we just went through the campinas temple, it was awesome. it is so green here. at least where there are no buildings. it is a huge city...it is crazy. the temple was beautiful. today is my first p-day so it is exciting cause we get to go out on the town. it is the 2 of september and i have not gotten a letter yet from anyone. what is up with that...you all forgot about me? hope not. i hope to hear from everyone soon. and i hope everything at home is going great. i am loving it here. i am getting close to my room ates and everyone...so that is good. the language will come eventually i hope. pray for me. i am praying for all of you. i love you very much, and thank you for everything.
love elder stanger