Saturday, August 8, 2009
Recent Letter from President Leal
LETTER FROM PRESIDENT LEAL
Dear Family of Elder Heperi,
Sister Leal and I are pleased to inform you that Elder Heperi has been called to be a Zone Leader. Your son has gained our confidence and we have observed his missionary service. We’re certain that he has the necessary qualities to fulfill his calling that is so important. He and his companion, who is also a Zone Leader, will be responsible for eight to eleven companionships of missionaries in their zone. Their greatest responsibilities are:
- Teach and Train
- Manage the zone, including interviews for baptism
- Communicate regularly with the mission president about the zone
- Delegate and guide through his love and example
The most important thing that has helped your son to be successful until now is the support of his family. Thank you so much for your support. We hope that you may continue to pray for him and offer your counsels. The Lord is blessing us here in the Brazil Londrina Mission and we are grateful for the opportunity to serve with Elder Heperi.
With Love,
President and Sister Leal
Missão Brasil LondrinaAv. Higienópolis 1100 sala 61Londrina, PRCEP:86020-911Fone:(43)3324-9346E-Mail: 2013096@ldschurch.org
RESPONSE
President Leal,
Thank you, again, for your most recent update regarding our son. We remain ever grateful for the opportunity he has been given to serve the Lord in Brazil. His service continues to bless both our immediate and extended family.
Our prayers remain constant on behalf of Elder Heperi, all of your missionaries, and more especially you and your dear wife. We are aware of the sacrifices you are all making and extend a special thanks for the leadership you are providing in the Londrina Mission.
The Lord bless you all!!!
With much gratitude for our association through Christ the Lord,
Elaine and Vernon Heperi
Monday, August 3, 2009
More work...
Me and Elder Lima at the baptism 2 weeks ago. The girl is Karina, and her brother baptized her.
Me messin' with a football.
Graffitti downtown.
Me and Elder Stowell in Londrina. Elder Stowell is from my group and this was the first and only time that I saw him in the field, as he went to the other mission soon after.
A Zone activity 2 months ago.
Well we've reached the end of yet another transfer. Today we find out about transfers, but I don´t think it´ll be until tonight. With a big group leaving, a smaller group coming in, and the missionaries from the other mission being moved around, it´s all up in the air as to where everybody is going.
It was a tough week as far as our investigators go. Basically all of them decided that they didn't want to hear the message anymore and told us not to come back. Also, we were encouraged by President to... review our teaching pool. The quest for these next few weeks will be for new investigators... who are willing to learn.
We finally got ourselves involved in the Ward Council meetings. Yesterday was a big meeting about how everybody can help the ward to grow, and more importantly, stop shrinking. Frequency is a little low a lot of the times, and yesterday I think there were less people in the chapel here than I was used to seeing at the branch in Adamantina which was a little scary. A nice thing though is that the ward here seems willing to go out and fix it, which is good.
Sounds like everybody is nice and nervous about the pig virus (swine flu). Elder Han... from my district got sick with some throat sickness this week (not Swine Flu), so Sister Loeal had him just stay at home the whole week, and forbade him to leave the house. As she put it, “The last thing we need is somebody thinking that the Mormons have Swine Flu, then nobody will let us in the houses!” He called me this week and was going a little stir-crazy, poor guy.
So the mission shopping is wrapping up for Levi, huh? That´s funny to think that he´ll be outta there in a month or so.
G´luck with that stuff.
Sa'll from me for now, til next time.
Elder =w= Heperi
It was a tough week as far as our investigators go. Basically all of them decided that they didn't want to hear the message anymore and told us not to come back. Also, we were encouraged by President to... review our teaching pool. The quest for these next few weeks will be for new investigators... who are willing to learn.
We finally got ourselves involved in the Ward Council meetings. Yesterday was a big meeting about how everybody can help the ward to grow, and more importantly, stop shrinking. Frequency is a little low a lot of the times, and yesterday I think there were less people in the chapel here than I was used to seeing at the branch in Adamantina which was a little scary. A nice thing though is that the ward here seems willing to go out and fix it, which is good.
Sounds like everybody is nice and nervous about the pig virus (swine flu). Elder Han... from my district got sick with some throat sickness this week (not Swine Flu), so Sister Loeal had him just stay at home the whole week, and forbade him to leave the house. As she put it, “The last thing we need is somebody thinking that the Mormons have Swine Flu, then nobody will let us in the houses!” He called me this week and was going a little stir-crazy, poor guy.
So the mission shopping is wrapping up for Levi, huh? That´s funny to think that he´ll be outta there in a month or so.
G´luck with that stuff.
Sa'll from me for now, til next time.
Elder =w= Heperi
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Rain and Raincoats
This week was a bit slow. Unfortunately, we spent more time hiding from thunderstorms than teaching. No joke, it rained every single day this week, and not just the little sprinkle kind. Full on Brazilian monsoon kind. (My comp says that they don´t have monsoon's in this part of the country, but I beg to differ.) Wet wet wet.
I´m glad that I have my big raincoat, as I´ve been using it all week. I get lots of compliments when I use it. Adults say I look more American with it on (I guess because of the heat here, nobody has a coat as big as mine) and kids say I look like Neo.
On a happy note, we had a baptism this week. A guy named Mau... who got back from his mission a few months ago had us start teaching his sister. She progressed really quickly, probably due to the fact that she had already been to church a few times and already knew a lot of the doctrine. Anyway, she became the only other active member of the family, so Mau... said he was really grateful.
Ha, today I feel like I dodged a bullet. There´s an all-day meeting with Pres. Leal and all the Zone Leaders. And as of yesterday, all the District Leaders were supposed to go. I was a little sad as that meant that my P-day would be spent in a meeting all day, but at the last minute I guess that President changed his mind. Hooray!
This next week is transfers, so we´ll see if everybody moves around. I´m pretty sure that me and Elder L... are gonna stay together. I guess a huge group is going home this time, with not to many arriving, so the mission will be a little emptier.
Welp, I think that´s all from me.
Sorry it´s so short this week.
´till next time.
-Elder =w= Me
I´m glad that I have my big raincoat, as I´ve been using it all week. I get lots of compliments when I use it. Adults say I look more American with it on (I guess because of the heat here, nobody has a coat as big as mine) and kids say I look like Neo.
On a happy note, we had a baptism this week. A guy named Mau... who got back from his mission a few months ago had us start teaching his sister. She progressed really quickly, probably due to the fact that she had already been to church a few times and already knew a lot of the doctrine. Anyway, she became the only other active member of the family, so Mau... said he was really grateful.
Ha, today I feel like I dodged a bullet. There´s an all-day meeting with Pres. Leal and all the Zone Leaders. And as of yesterday, all the District Leaders were supposed to go. I was a little sad as that meant that my P-day would be spent in a meeting all day, but at the last minute I guess that President changed his mind. Hooray!
This next week is transfers, so we´ll see if everybody moves around. I´m pretty sure that me and Elder L... are gonna stay together. I guess a huge group is going home this time, with not to many arriving, so the mission will be a little emptier.
Welp, I think that´s all from me.
Sorry it´s so short this week.
´till next time.
-Elder =w= Me
Monday, July 20, 2009
Pushin' the Elders
Hmmm...sounds like quite the party was had at Rob’s homecoming talk, huh? I tell you, there better be at least that many people at my one, or I’m going to weep bitterly for having lost the RM popularity contest.
A lot more moving around of missionaries happened this week. I guess the missionaries that we got from the new areas have a different transfer schedule than us. Their transfer ended, today, so some missionaries went home, which generated a little chaos with some emergency transfers. I’m not even sure if the same missionaries are in my district anymore, so I guess I’ll find out this week.
This week we were highly disappointed as two really good families we were teaching didn’t make it to church. We stopped by to visit one of them with the bishop (The family is Ro... and Pat... and their kids) on Saturday night, only to find that Pat... had gotten some pretty bad food poisoning and had to go to the hospital, so that was a no go. The other family had relatives visit from out of town at the last minute, and couldn’t go either. (BTW: that’s probably the most common excuse that I hear, that some relatives showed up last minute to see them, but this time it was actually legit. We stopped by their house just to make sure)
There was a ward temple trip this last week, so about half the ward went for about a week to the São Paulo Temple. It made it a little difficult to teach lessons with the members, but we’re hoping that they are back with some extra motivation.
I talked to a guy who I think had the best/most extreme reaction to my talking to him about the gospel. Me and my comp. were strolling along, when I spotted a nice couple in front of us. (In their late 40´s or so). Stopping to talk to them, I had just opened my mouth and stuck out my hand to shake hands, when the guy screamed “Noooooo! I already follow a religion! I’m already Christian!” Then he shoved me in the chest and started backing up slowly like I was wielding a knife or something. I looked at his wife who was pretty calm and expected something like, “Oh, don’t mind him, he’s a bit nuts.” Or an “I’m sorry that he pushed you,” from her. But, she just started shaking her head and said “We already have a religion.” At that point the guy grabbed her hand and they were off at a pretty brisk pace. That guy definately gets the award.
Well, sáll from me for now.
Till next time;
-Elder =w= Heperi
A lot more moving around of missionaries happened this week. I guess the missionaries that we got from the new areas have a different transfer schedule than us. Their transfer ended, today, so some missionaries went home, which generated a little chaos with some emergency transfers. I’m not even sure if the same missionaries are in my district anymore, so I guess I’ll find out this week.
This week we were highly disappointed as two really good families we were teaching didn’t make it to church. We stopped by to visit one of them with the bishop (The family is Ro... and Pat... and their kids) on Saturday night, only to find that Pat... had gotten some pretty bad food poisoning and had to go to the hospital, so that was a no go. The other family had relatives visit from out of town at the last minute, and couldn’t go either. (BTW: that’s probably the most common excuse that I hear, that some relatives showed up last minute to see them, but this time it was actually legit. We stopped by their house just to make sure)
There was a ward temple trip this last week, so about half the ward went for about a week to the São Paulo Temple. It made it a little difficult to teach lessons with the members, but we’re hoping that they are back with some extra motivation.
I talked to a guy who I think had the best/most extreme reaction to my talking to him about the gospel. Me and my comp. were strolling along, when I spotted a nice couple in front of us. (In their late 40´s or so). Stopping to talk to them, I had just opened my mouth and stuck out my hand to shake hands, when the guy screamed “Noooooo! I already follow a religion! I’m already Christian!” Then he shoved me in the chest and started backing up slowly like I was wielding a knife or something. I looked at his wife who was pretty calm and expected something like, “Oh, don’t mind him, he’s a bit nuts.” Or an “I’m sorry that he pushed you,” from her. But, she just started shaking her head and said “We already have a religion.” At that point the guy grabbed her hand and they were off at a pretty brisk pace. That guy definately gets the award.
Well, sáll from me for now.
Till next time;
-Elder =w= Heperi
Monday, July 13, 2009
Letter from/to Parkway 2nd Ward CTR 5 Primary Class
LETTER FROM PRIMARY
Dear Elder Heperi,
Our class has been learning about missionaries and how Heavenly Father blesses and helps them. Our class wanted you to know that Heavenly Father loves you and protects you. Your family loves you too.
We hope you have a good day on your mission. Be happy, good, and keep
smiling.
Our class was wondering if you are a good missionary? Do you like Brazil? We hope you are safe, and you can help your family when you get home.
Sincerely,
The CTR 5 Primary Class
Parkway 2nd Ward
Cooper Roscher
Jackson McCarty
Keith Borrowman
Sierra Walker
Lydia Peterson
Madeline Stochlia
Danielle Slagowski, and
Sister Martin (Teacher).
RESPONSE
Dear Primary Class,
Thanks a lot for the letter. I really appreciated the love and concern that you guys show for me. It helps to know that people pray for me, even while I’m far from home.
I do my best to be a good missionary. It isn’t always easy, but it’s always worth it to follow the Lord’s commandments.
I’m loving it here in Brazil. The people are very friendly, the food delicious, and the members very accepting. Thank you again!
-Elder Heperi
Weather still cool...
Another cold week.
Ha, I feel bad for my comp. because every night he goes to bed looking like he’s going to leave for a Klondike campout(pants,sweatshirts,gloves,beanie) even though it’s only about 14 Celsius in the house. He’s really missing that Northern Brazilian sun right now…
This week, my comp and I have got to go help the other Elders in the district with some of their work. Unfortunately, with us losing a bunch of areas and missionaries, there are two newbie’s together as comps. (One Elder has about 6 months, and the other is only in his 3rd week in the field), so we get to head over there and help them with some stuff. The Elder in his 3rd week has had 3 companions in 3 weeks because of all the moving around that’s been happening. Poor guy never gets a chance to get used to anybody. His name is Elder D.S., and it turns out that he’s a rugby player and a big NZ All-Blacks fan. He plays on some local team in his city in southern Brazil (which is pretty rare, as rugby isn’t very popular here). I think you’d like to meet him someday, Dad. He wants to buy a ball here at the store, just that it´s about 130 Reals. Maybe we could get a game started some P-day...heh.
We found a bunch of good people to teach this week, but unfortunately everybody really good isn’t married, or has a family who doesn’t like the church and ends up scaring the person away. We found this really good guy named Fe... who actually asked during the lesson “You know, I’ve always really wanted to know, with so many churches around here, there must be just one that’s true. But which is it?” His wife also just had a baby, and he asked “Where was she before she was born last week?” Two questions that we, of course, love to hear. We had a great lesson with him, but unfortunately right as we were finishing, his uncle (a minister) showed up. We just passed him on the way out, but he didn’t look too happy to see us. Anyway, long-story short, Fe... told us later that it would be best if we didn’t come back. Definately a low point on the week.
On a higher note, Se... (our investigator that needs to get married and stop smoking) managed to stop smoking this past week. He had been cutting it down to about 2 cigarettes per day for a while now, but finally decided just to stop altogether. Now we just got to see about that dang marriage…
For P-day today, we’ve got a nice basketball game lined up with the whole district. I haven’t actually played basketball since I left the MTC in São Paulo, as it’s kind of difficult to find somebody who has a good basketball (or a bad one for that matter) and even harder to find a court with hoops. (They have a lot of basketball courts here, just that kids like to hang on the hoops instead of playing basketball, and they’re always broken.) We’ll see how it goes. We usually play Brazilian's against American's when it comes to sports, which means that we lose quite badly when it comes to soccer, so I figure we might do well today in basketball. (Actually, there’s only 3 Americans, Me, Elder Han... and Elder Har....)
Sáll from me today.
´till next time!
-Elder =w= Heperi
Ha, I feel bad for my comp. because every night he goes to bed looking like he’s going to leave for a Klondike campout(pants,sweatshirts,gloves,beanie) even though it’s only about 14 Celsius in the house. He’s really missing that Northern Brazilian sun right now…
This week, my comp and I have got to go help the other Elders in the district with some of their work. Unfortunately, with us losing a bunch of areas and missionaries, there are two newbie’s together as comps. (One Elder has about 6 months, and the other is only in his 3rd week in the field), so we get to head over there and help them with some stuff. The Elder in his 3rd week has had 3 companions in 3 weeks because of all the moving around that’s been happening. Poor guy never gets a chance to get used to anybody. His name is Elder D.S., and it turns out that he’s a rugby player and a big NZ All-Blacks fan. He plays on some local team in his city in southern Brazil (which is pretty rare, as rugby isn’t very popular here). I think you’d like to meet him someday, Dad. He wants to buy a ball here at the store, just that it´s about 130 Reals. Maybe we could get a game started some P-day...heh.
We found a bunch of good people to teach this week, but unfortunately everybody really good isn’t married, or has a family who doesn’t like the church and ends up scaring the person away. We found this really good guy named Fe... who actually asked during the lesson “You know, I’ve always really wanted to know, with so many churches around here, there must be just one that’s true. But which is it?” His wife also just had a baby, and he asked “Where was she before she was born last week?” Two questions that we, of course, love to hear. We had a great lesson with him, but unfortunately right as we were finishing, his uncle (a minister) showed up. We just passed him on the way out, but he didn’t look too happy to see us. Anyway, long-story short, Fe... told us later that it would be best if we didn’t come back. Definately a low point on the week.
On a higher note, Se... (our investigator that needs to get married and stop smoking) managed to stop smoking this past week. He had been cutting it down to about 2 cigarettes per day for a while now, but finally decided just to stop altogether. Now we just got to see about that dang marriage…
For P-day today, we’ve got a nice basketball game lined up with the whole district. I haven’t actually played basketball since I left the MTC in São Paulo, as it’s kind of difficult to find somebody who has a good basketball (or a bad one for that matter) and even harder to find a court with hoops. (They have a lot of basketball courts here, just that kids like to hang on the hoops instead of playing basketball, and they’re always broken.) We’ll see how it goes. We usually play Brazilian's against American's when it comes to sports, which means that we lose quite badly when it comes to soccer, so I figure we might do well today in basketball. (Actually, there’s only 3 Americans, Me, Elder Han... and Elder Har....)
Sáll from me today.
´till next time!
-Elder =w= Heperi
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Scaring the Drunks
Sad as it seems, I completely forgot about the 4th of July until yesterday. Too bad, as I was gonna celebrate by lighting something on fire. Also, I´m a bit tired of hearing all the news about Michael Jackson dying. If it happens in the USA, it becomes the question of the week for people to ask me around here.
Yeah, so the big news this week was the mission boundaries changing. I guess it happened to all or most of the missions in Brazil. (BTW, I hear that the Rio North and and Rio mission are now one mission. Does that mean that Jeff Johnson and Jenny Morrisse are in the same mission now?) We lost the state of Mato Grosso Do Sul (Where I was in Ponta Porã and Campo Grande), along with about 24 or so missionaries who were there to the Cuiabá Mission. A good chunk of the Elders that´d I would be coming home with went there, including Elder Mont... It was actually pretty sad to hear about it, and President had a meeting for us last week, and he was feeling it too. We did gain a couple of cities here in the state of Paraná though, so maybe I´ll get to go there sometime. Who knows? I was glad to stay put here in Londrina, but I did think that it would have been interesting to say that I served in 2 different missions, if I had had to switch.
Some companionships got shifted around, so my comp. Elder Per... went somewhere else, and now I´m with Elder Lima. He´s from the city of Belém (Bethlehem in Portuguese) in the state of Pará, which I found out is a city that sits basically on the equator. He said that 105 F weather is pretty normal for him, which makes me happy that I´m not serving there. Unfortunately, he´s suffering a bit for the cold here., (65 F for him is cold) and usually walks around in a long sleeve shirt and gloves. Ha, he´s a good guy, and we get along pretty well.
This week, church moved from it´s 10:00 am time slot to 8:30, which resulted in many people not showing up to church yesterday. I personally like the 8:30 time better, but 10 was a lot easier for our investigators. The frequency is kinda low at our ward, at times approaching the number of people that would go to church in Adamantina. (That´s worrysome). Those who do go to church seem to be a happy, motivated lot, which helps when we have investigators at church.
President challenged us to invite people to get baptized more, even in our contacts on the road, so we´ve been having success on that front. Those who do accept a visit already know why we´re there, and so they´re more prepared. I´ve also found that it helps scare away drunks. Last night we were doing contacts when some drunk guy approached us and started begging for money. (At least he was honest. I asked him why he needed money, and he said he wanted more beer.) I told him that we didn´t have any, but that we could help him to be baptized and could even show him the baptismal font. He looked a little fearful, and left in a big hurry after that.
Not much else from me.
Hey, I thought that Rob and Alex would be home by now, but not till next week, huh?
Did Levi get all his mission shopping done?
´till next week.
Excelcior!
-Elder =w= you-know-who
Yeah, so the big news this week was the mission boundaries changing. I guess it happened to all or most of the missions in Brazil. (BTW, I hear that the Rio North and and Rio mission are now one mission. Does that mean that Jeff Johnson and Jenny Morrisse are in the same mission now?) We lost the state of Mato Grosso Do Sul (Where I was in Ponta Porã and Campo Grande), along with about 24 or so missionaries who were there to the Cuiabá Mission. A good chunk of the Elders that´d I would be coming home with went there, including Elder Mont... It was actually pretty sad to hear about it, and President had a meeting for us last week, and he was feeling it too. We did gain a couple of cities here in the state of Paraná though, so maybe I´ll get to go there sometime. Who knows? I was glad to stay put here in Londrina, but I did think that it would have been interesting to say that I served in 2 different missions, if I had had to switch.
Some companionships got shifted around, so my comp. Elder Per... went somewhere else, and now I´m with Elder Lima. He´s from the city of Belém (Bethlehem in Portuguese) in the state of Pará, which I found out is a city that sits basically on the equator. He said that 105 F weather is pretty normal for him, which makes me happy that I´m not serving there. Unfortunately, he´s suffering a bit for the cold here., (65 F for him is cold) and usually walks around in a long sleeve shirt and gloves. Ha, he´s a good guy, and we get along pretty well.
This week, church moved from it´s 10:00 am time slot to 8:30, which resulted in many people not showing up to church yesterday. I personally like the 8:30 time better, but 10 was a lot easier for our investigators. The frequency is kinda low at our ward, at times approaching the number of people that would go to church in Adamantina. (That´s worrysome). Those who do go to church seem to be a happy, motivated lot, which helps when we have investigators at church.
President challenged us to invite people to get baptized more, even in our contacts on the road, so we´ve been having success on that front. Those who do accept a visit already know why we´re there, and so they´re more prepared. I´ve also found that it helps scare away drunks. Last night we were doing contacts when some drunk guy approached us and started begging for money. (At least he was honest. I asked him why he needed money, and he said he wanted more beer.) I told him that we didn´t have any, but that we could help him to be baptized and could even show him the baptismal font. He looked a little fearful, and left in a big hurry after that.
Not much else from me.
Hey, I thought that Rob and Alex would be home by now, but not till next week, huh?
Did Levi get all his mission shopping done?
´till next week.
Excelcior!
-Elder =w= you-know-who
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