New transfer, same comp.

New transfer, but me and Elder De Angelo are stayin.

O yeah, Happy birthday’s to Levi and Lauren. Hey Lauren, if you lived here in Brazil, you’d have a huge party, because for some reason, a girl’s 15 year old birthday is one of the most important. I dunno why.

Hey, thanks for sending me an update of them Magleby´s. They do write short letters, don’t they? That’s weird to think that Andy only has one transfer left. And that’s great that he gets to hit Burger King when I have one just 15 min from my house and can’t go because it’s in Paraguay. The sacrifices…

As for wondering about how close the food at Tucanos is to real Brazilian food…I’d say it’s pretty dang close. The BBQ places that they have here that are the equivalent of Tucanos, called “Churrascarias”, basically serve the same type of food. The only thing is that they are a bit expensive, so I’ve only been to one here on the mission. Basically the diet here is a lot of beans, rice, meat, and salad. (Not like American salad. It’s pretty sour. I had to get used to it.) I guess I’ve kinda gotten more educated about the World since I got here. Before the mish., I just kinda assumed that everyone south of Tucson, Arizona ate spicy stuff, but here, nobody even has any idea what a taco is. (Taco in Portuguese can mean “baseball bat” or “golf club”, so the first time I asked if people here eat tacos, I got a strange look.)

I do have one request. If anybody has a good apple pie recipe they could send me, I’d be very grateful. Although I’ve never cooked anything more complicated than eggs, I’d like to try my luck. Thanks!

Well, back to stuff that matters. This week our baptisms that we had marked fell thru because some investigators didn’t show up to church; some went and bought more cigarettes when they threw out the old ones; and some felt that they weren’t prepared yet. Word of Wisdom and getting to church on time/at all are the problems that the majority of our investigators have. Not everybody smokes, but as I found out, everyone and their dog drinks a good amount of coffee. (Literally some dogs too. One family gives the old, cold coffee to the family dog.)

On a good up side, we picked up a family of 5 to teach. I guess someone talked to them on the road about 3 months ago, but their address got lost in the Area Book. They’re pretty cool, and as an added bonus, when we showed up there for the appointment, one of the guys from the other ward happened to be hanging out with one of the girls there, so we got in a good lesson with a member. The Dad in the family used to be a Jehovah’s Witness, has been reading the Book of Mormon for about 6 months now, and is already in Alma. He said he’s enjoying it, but finds parts of it a bit hard to understand. His only complaint about it is, “Just when I get to start to liking and enjoying Nephi, suddenly a new guy like this Jacob or Alma guy comes in and I have to start learning everybody’s names again!”

We had the opportunity to explain about the different prophets and why it’s important to have them. I also got to emphasis why it’s so important to pray about the book, not just read it. He and the rest of the family promised to read and pray, so I have high expectations.

A thing I’ve noticed is that it’s kind of a new thing for people to pray in the way that we teach them. Usually when we ask if they’re used to praying, everybody says, “Yeah.” What they mean by “yeah” is that they know some of the words to the Lord’s Prayer or Ave Maria or something like that and say it a couple of days a week. Everybody is always embarrassed to say a prayer out loud at the end of the lessons, but when they do, the vast majority feel it's a good change and that they’re getting somewhere.

Yesterday was pretty rough for me. We planned pretty well, but everyone we went to visit wasn't home, and knocking doors wasn't going to well either. We taught about 4 lessons that day, but it just seemed to me that no one was really paying attention. We were teaching, testifying, asking questions, and basically doing everything, but I didn’t feel like any of them were feeling the Spirit. Those are the kind of days and types of lessons that I like the least. People rejecting us and people accepting I’m used to, but apathy towards our message kinda makes me, I dunno, irritated. So the day was rough, up until the last lesson of the day. We brought a member who works at the same place as one of the twins that we’re teaching, and he bore a good testimony about the importance of reading and praying about the book. One of them reads all the parts that we mark and has prayed to know about it, but doesn’t feel that she got an answer. The other never really makes time to read. But I think that they really felt the impact of the message from the testimony of that Brother.

To finish on an interesting note, this week I found out another interesting term in Portuguese. We were teaching some new investigators, and they had the usual question about why we are both called Elder. After which, they asked what our real first names were. Elder De Angelo’s is Anthony, but that names a little hard to say for Brazilians that so he just said Antonio. I could Portuguese my name and say Lucas, but I’ve never like that name. (I see it as an inferior version of my name.) So I just say "Luke", to which everybody always repeats “Lukie?” Well, as it turns out, here they call a belly shirt or a tank top a “Baby Lukie”, so I was happy to find out that my name can be an enormous joke here in Brazil. Who knew that all my growing up years when you guys would call me “Lukie” I was really just being called a belly shirt?

Well, that’s me time for this week.

Thanks again, and good luck with the birthday parties!

-Elder “belly-shirt” Heperi

Oh yeah, and thanks for letting Tristan (and anybody else in the future that asks) know that there is no pouch mail for Brazil. As one of the Church News says that I got “Pouch Service to Brazil and its 27 missions has been discontinued, largely due to the improvement of the Brazilian Postal System.” So send freely to the mission home!

Thanks again, and see ya next week! (Not literally)

-me

Acai exists in the supermarket!

Hey, so first of congrats to Chad and Amelia for their calls. It´s nice to hear that good ól Parkway 2nd is still goin´ strong in the missionary department. Chad, can I have your Xbox 360 when I get home?

Lots of happenings this week. This week is the last week in the transfer because I guess that some Visas expire earlier, so some Americans have to go home just a wee bit sooner. Also, we managed to line up about 8 baptisms this last week…only to have none of them show up for church this week. Everyone was all excited and all...but unfortunately the investigators didn't wake up on time. We showed up at their houses, but no one was awake. It was quite disappointing, but we´ll try again next week with everybody.

Our two most likely prospects are two twin girls who I suspect just called a pass along card because two blond blue-eyed Americans gave them one, but have since become the most likely baptismal candidates. They both have baptisms marked for about two weeks in the future, and our only problems are getting one to stop drinking coffee (shouldn´t be too hard) and the other to stop with her boyfriend. (Law of Chastity problem. Might be a little harder…) What´s more, is that they each have two kids each, and are only 22. The good news is that they see why the commandments that we´re teaching them are good, as they´ve already experienced why we need the commandments, now we just need them to live it.

As for non-baptism news, I managed to discover that they sell that fruit that I wrote about a few weeks back. (Açaí). I´m pretty excited, because it´s way cheap here, so I´m gonna see what kind of breakfast I can make with it.

Well, that´s it for me this week. `till next time!

-Me


Again, sorry for the short letter, but I´m organizing the photos. Hope all is well with you guys, and thanks again!

Summertime

Yes, I did receive my package at the last Zone Conference. Thanks a lot for the CD player, and that CD. Kolob´s my favorite hymn, so thanks for finding a version of it.

Zone Conference was an interesting experience. I´m used to Zone Conference being kinda huge with a couple of zones, but as there is no Zone out here in Ponta Porã or the neighboring cities, it was just with about 18 missionaries. I actually liked it better because we all got to participate and talk to Pres. Leal, which is kinda rare when you have a huge Zone Conference. Also, I got assigned as interpreter for one of the new Americans. Pres. Leal wanted to make sure that he understood what was going on, which is a change from when I was in my first transfer. I would just sit a smile and nod like I knew what was going on.

Thanks to Mat6t for his very informative letter about sweat glands. I learned much. I´ve finally had the chance to sleep with my sweatpants that I brought with me. Our house is built at just the right angle and has just the right amount of roof over the porch that the sunlight never ever touches any part of our windows or doors. Consequently, it´s always freezing inside our house at night and in the morning, so I get a chance to finally use all the warm clothes that I brought that I thought I´d never use. I like this time of the year.

So Russia closed for missionaries from other countries, huh? Wow, that´s different. I guess Rob gets to be one of the last special for a little bit. BTW, I´d like to send a letter to him. Anybody able to send me his mailing address? I´ve managed to get in contact with Alex Morrise, Dave Ridge and Jake Green (roomie at Heritage) by letter so far, so I wanna see if I can get one to Comrade Magleby.

This past week was a pretty low one number wise. Elder De... was kinda discouraged with it, as I guess it was his worst week since he got here. On Monday, all of our appointments managed to fall, and everybody that we tried to visit was either traveling or visiting their sick mother(two likely excuses…). To cap it off, our best investigators, a family of six, four of which have baptismal dates, didn´t show up to church because apparently there was a party next door and nobody got any sleep Saturday night. It was kinda depressing.

On the up side, we´ve been having success with holding some family nights in members houses. And by success, I mean we´ve held one so far and got an investigator to come. Lessons with members are always good.

Oh yeah, that reminds me of something. We watched a part of the Curitiba Temple dedication celebration at a members house this past week as part of the family night, and I remembered something funny that Pres. Monson did when I was watching it in Bauru. After the opening song-thingy, he went up to the podium with his interpreter. He started off with a joke. “When the singing was going on, I thought that I saw a dove descending from the sky. But then I looked again, and saw that it was just a pigeon.” All the Americans in the room laughed. But when the interpreter repeated the joke in Portuguese, nobody laughed, because unfortunately dove and pigeon are the same word in Portuguese (pomba). So all he said was “I thought I saw a dove, but when I looked again, I saw that it was just a dove.” I thought it was even funnier that the joke didn´t translate. All the Brazilains were wondering what we were laughing at.

Also this week, I taught a lady who wasn´t really responsive the message of the restoration and Joseph Smith, and didn´t want a return visit. but above that she seemed to think that she had heard it before from missionaries from another church. When I asked what church, she responded “It was the JW´s. They teach the same story.” We actually failed to convince her that they don´t teach that but she was convinced and wouldn´t hear any of it, so we just kinda left it. I guess it´s just our job to clear up doctrinal questions about our church, not the others.

Well, ´till next week.

Excelcior!

-Luuuuuuuuuuuke

6 Elders, One House

Hey, congrats to Jeff Johnson for his call to Rio de Janeiro. Good luck man, and make sure you look for and say hi to an Elder Honeycutt there, one of the Americans from my group at the MTC. Good guy, even though he plays football for the Utes. (I think you might remember him mom and dad, we met him at the airport the day I left. He was the one with the three girls following him around.) And good luck with spending all three major holidays in the MTC. Remember, if you can make it past Christmas, you´re home free.

So this week is Zone Conference. Tomorrow we travel to Dourados and get to receive instruction/hang out with some of the other Elders. I´m excited.

This area definately has a different feel to it. People are a lot more willing to let us in to hear the message, but unfortunately it´s still pretty hard to get people to come to church... If it´s too cold outside, the won´t leave their houses to go to church.

So yeah, my area is pretty cool. It´s also significantly richer than my last area. There´s some ridiculously big houses around here, and even one that´s a replica of Elvis´s house in Graceland that someone lives in. I really wanna knock there and see if they´ll accept the message/let me in and see the house. I´ll try to get a picture to show you guys. It´s pretty sweet.

Also, apparently some church member years ago owned a lot of roads and property around here, so he named some stuff after the church. In our area, we have a Road Angel Moroni and Road Joseph Smith.

Well, that´s my time this week.

See ya next time.

-Excelcior!

Oh yeah, I heard something about China opening for missionary work. Is that true? Somebody tell me.

I Guess I'm Not Hawaiian

Well, I arrived in Ponta Porã. This place is pretty interesting. I'll try to answer all of your questions. (That was a lot that you asked, so I hope that I remember all of them.)

So I arrived pretty late last week here, but fortunately my comp, Elder De Angelo (his name kinda looks Brazilian to me, but he's definitely American. He´s a nice kid, and about as pink as I am brown. He´s from Nevada, and he actually attended BYU and lived in Heritage Halls at the same time that I was there. Small world. He has about 1 yr. on his mission.) arranged a ride for us. The member who gave us a ride actually served in the Utah Provo Mission from 01-03, so I got to reminisce with him about Provo a bit. His wife was in the car too, and it was funny, because she only speaks a little bit of Portuguese, but is fluent in Spanish. So he´d relate what was going on to her in Spanish.

As for the city itself, it´s significantly smaller than Bauru, but it has a more friendly feel. The streets here are about as wide as any street in Provo, which is a nice change from the narrow roads that I´m used too. And what´s more, people here actually have lawns! I think I only saw about two houses in Bauru that had a lawn, but here there´s grass everywhere. I´m loving it. The city is kind of a mix of a lot of things. The outskirts of the city remind me of Ephraim, the downtown part is kinda like a little slice of Southern California, and we walked thru a park one night that looked exactly like one in Provo, only it had palm trees instead of pine. Cool stuff.

As you learned from Google Earth, the city has the Brazilian side, and the Paraguayan (is that right?) side. The border is about 6 blocks from our house, and doesn´t have a border crossing or anything, which is cool. The only sad part is that we can only go into the Supermarket in Paraguay, which is very unfortunate because I saw a Burger King there as we were pulling into town, and they have a mall of imported stuff (Root Beer, Maple Syrup). Apparently they have some cool stores with really cheap stuff in Paraguay.

The supermarket was a fun experience. I almost cried when I saw that they had Trix and Fruit Loops. Unfortunately I was running a little low on cash that day, so I had to settle for buying a kilo of Frosted Flakes at only 6 Reals, which is something of a miracle at that price. Looks like I get to return to my cereal eating habits for now!

The city has a good mix of Brazilians and Paraguayans, which is cool, although it does make it a little difficult to make contacts sometimes. Sunday night I was doing a trade with one of the Brazilian Elders in my district, and I stopped a man on the sidewalk and started talking to him. After I gave my little spiel, he started responding, and suddenly I felt like I was in my first week in the mission again, because I wasn´t understanding very much. It took me a second to realize that he was speaking Spanish. I guess he understood what I said, because he was responding, but I couldn´t make too much sense of it. So I just gave him a pass-along card and we moved on. I guess that´s kinda how things work here. I guess I´ll have to start practicing saying my “Buenos Dias” instead of “Bom Dia”.

My ward here is good as well. The Chapel here is way nice, about three times the size of my last chapel. And what´s more, they have a Piano, which is a nice change as well. My last ward just had an old organ that would sometimes play by itself during a meeting. I swear that it was possessed. Also, the ward doesn´t have a pianist, so I´m it again for my ward, as well as for the Ward Choir. (Which apparently doesn´t exist yet, but will start soon.) Also, we have the ward the other Elders meet at in the same building just a half-hour later, and they don´t have a pianist either, so I suspect I´ll be playing for them as well. It´s pretty funny.

We only have three areas (3 companionship's) in Ponta Porã, so that´s a change, as Bauru had something like 12 or 14 companionship's, so I´m used to a big zone. We only have a District here, as a zone needs at least 4 companionship's.

My ward is called Ponta Porã 1st and the Elders from Ponta Porã 2nd live in our house as well. Our house is better than my last house, (with some exceptions. The Bathroom is separated from the main part of the house, so it´s always freezing in the morning.) The weather is nice here too, actually significantly colder than Bauru, and I´m actually using my Elvis pajama pants to sleep in now.

Well, I´m outta time, so I´ve just got one more experience. When I arrived at the first house that we ate lunch at, the Sister there asked me where I was from. When I responded “Provo, Utah”, she said “Hey, you´re not Hawaiian!” Apparently, the last District Leader had heard that I was Hawaiian, and told some of the members that they were getting "a real live Hawaiian." I guess I disappointed some people.

´till next week!

Excelsior!

Luke “The Hawaiian” Heperi