May 16, 2011

Haha,

You mean,

Oi Elder Dawson,

Yes, I am still an elder! I'm glad my little prank worked, but you almost hung up on me when I called with flight information! I am SO excited to fly out! I have a bunch of pass along cards and a Book of Mormon ready! And when we get to Sao Paulo I am totally making contacts left and right. Ha, I guess I might be able to call from both airports, we will see. And I do not have Ashley’s cell phone number but that would be fun to call her too.  Please talk to Brother Merrell to make sure it is alright!! About Dad's letter, I never got it through 'dear elder’; it was like an email confirmation thing on my email. Oh well.

I am sick of correcting spelling and grammatical errors so from here on out, I’m sorry.

I will be sending home a lot of pics soon! They are missing some funny moments from the past few days, but they are still good. Thank you for giving my new address to everyone. I don't even know what my address will be! But, yes my schedule has changed with my leaving Wednesday. Today was supposed to be p-day but they have a whole in-field orientation thing today...all day. It is slow moving, but good. It is mostly telling the Elders and Sisters not to do anything stupid and how to make contacts so far. Tomorrow will be my new p-day, but that doesn’t mean a second letter ;). I don't know how I am going to fit everything back into my luggage! And do a 24 hour flight! Haha!  I have a plan for not watching the movie, so it will be okay. Besides, there is plenty of Portuguese for me to learn still, and we are never done learning about the gospel.  The second we think that we have got it, is the second that we give up.

So I guess 30 something Elders got their visas this week. There will be 19 of us flying out Wednesday morning. I am a travel leader so we will see how that goes. There are only 3 elders not leaving from my district, Elder Lambrachsten (companino), Elder Claudio, and Elder Perkes. They are awesome guys but I guess there is something for us to learn wherever we are. There are about 8 Elders at the MTC here that will be in my mission. I am pretty sure I am the only one not from Utah.  It is ridiculous how many are from here.

About Sister -----, she is still having some problems; it looks like she will have to go home. She has trigerminal neuralgia. What can you tell me about that? It was the SADDEST thing this Sunday. We were in a going away fireside and I was sitting next to her, all of a sudden she started having a lot of pain to the point of tears. I was so close to bawling my eyes out, I practically did. I know God has a plan for her and this may be a trial. I trust in His plan, but that doesn't mean we can't pray and fast. I started a fast immediately. It is just crazy. She was so nice and sweet after too. She was smiling ear to ear and acting like nothing happened. I told her that she needs to do whatever it takes to get better, after all, she has the life after and the millennium to do all the missionary work she can. She really liked that. I hope she gets better.

Oh man, books books books. I don't know how I am going to pack it all! My backpack is going to be filled to the brim. I have grammatical books, conjugational books, pronunciation and then a copy of everything I have in English in Portuguese! Ah! We will see though. I guess we actually get more weight than we thought, like 70 lbs or something.

Sounds like the whole Stugo situation is going well! Let me know how everything goes and Ashley’s decisions about prom.

I am starting to run out of time because I had to read your emails so this will be short.

Tell Ashley that if she wants I have several elders that would enjoy letters ;).  I haven't found anybody worthy yet...or if I ever will, I don't know. Torrin's letter was great! I enjoyed it! Keep 'em coming!

I will have to address things later on the phone, but it was good getting your emails/ letters and thank you!

Really quick, give this to Kyle:

I would prepare by reading the Book of Mormon and focusing on charity: the pure love of Christ. Focus on His values and principles.

Effective missionaries need to work work work. It is not your two years, it is the Lord’s.

My life is infinitely better because of serving. All decisions are made by the spirit and who knows what is better for us more that God.

I love you all

I know that God listens to our prayers and that Christ has felt everything we feel. Everything. Keep up the prayers and fasting for the people of Brazil and sister ------ and talk to ya Wednesday!

Ciao voces amo,

Elder Dawson