Monday, September 1, 2014
So the past two weeks have kind of blended in together.  Getting the new área down and trying to establish something here.  I know the área pretty well know, now the hard part is getting a group together.  We have been working a ton and seeing few results, but that will change this week.  We gave talks yesterday in sacrament, but only 54 people were there.  They are talking about maybe closing our ward,  so now us 4 are going to save it.  We have a couple of plans that we will put in action this week.  Be praying for our success and that the ward will open up.  There are a ton of wards splitting and our branch in Juquitiba finally split!  love yall

New companion

Monday, August 18, 2014

This week was great!  We worked really hard trying all that we could to get new investigators.  Saw peacocks in the road the other day walking around, that was cool and a couple of people stopped us this week telling us that they wanted to go to church!  Saw a recent convert from Noronha on Tuesday, she studies close to the chapel where we do district meeting.  Basically this week was just getting to know the area and the people.  The church is really nice, opened in February and it's really big.  We live next to the train so going places is really easy.  There is a sister from Amarillo, or some place in north TX,  so that's cool.  My comp is from Colorado but he was born in Honduras.  He has 9 months on his mission and served in Oregon for 8 months. The last elder in my first MTC group got his visa so he is coming down soon, so that will be really cool.  My companion knows Spanish so we have been speaking Spanish some times and I am getting really good with Spanish because it's really close to Português.  He is having knee therapy so we have been going into the city a little and it is so cool. The buildings are so nice,  buildings with 2 story apartments, with a giant window and a big arch on each floor. Will take pictures because its nice.  I have been getting really good at cooking.  Made grilled chicken sandwiches the other day and last night I made pork chops.  Have a great week sending Rach away and getting ready for school. I'ts going to be great! Love ya'll!

Elder Anderson

de nova

Monday, August 11, 2014

I loved reading the e-mails this week.  Looks like things went great in Utah.  So glad that ya’ll made it back safely.  This week was crazy for all of us here in the zone.  My companion had his birthday on Monday, so we had a party, made the cake that yall sent.  We can now say that we closed a church on our mission.  Went to go teach an old guy that takes care of a church.  He let us enter and see it and when we were leaving we shut the door.  Effectively closing the church, haha.   Tuesday we had a district meeting and after lunch we got a service project of painting a member´s new snack place thing in the garage.   On Wednesday we had a special meeting with Presidente about baptisms and how we can have more. After the assistentes came up to me and my companion and told us that Pres. wanted to talk to us.  so we waited and he took my companion aside and talked to him, and he came back, and took me and said that he was going to put the two zones in our stake together again and make one zone, my comp and I would be emergency transferred to other áreas, he would continue as a zone leader and I would helping another missionary adapt.  So that was cool, just that we couldn´t tell anyone.  The rest of the day was hard accepting all that would happen, I was only in that ward 3 weeks and my comp. 4 months.  We kept acting like everything was normal.  Had the biggest lunch of my life.  The missionaries were talking since the first day about this sister that makes a ton of food and keeps putting food on our plate until you die.  We went there and I escaped death because I hid behind another elder that looks like me, so I was great and the others were having trouble walking, haha.  Anyway, went on a division with the other dl, found another pizza place to teach, speaking of which the pizzaria that I was teaching in my last área got baptized this week!   Sunday we let the other missionaries know what would happen and we packed. Today we went to the office at 730 and I got my new companion and am now in Primavera Interlagos, and my old comp is my zl! So excited to be here, opening área again! SÒ ALEGRIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love ya'll tons, pin drive broke so I will send fotos next time. 

Elder Anderson

Miracles

Monday, August 4, 2014

This week was crazy!!!!!!!!!!  On Monday we made french toast and homemade syrup.  Later that day one of our investigators gave us weed because he is giving up drugs, so we were walking around the favela with weed.  Then on Tuesday we had lunch at a recent convert´s and the minute we walked in I knew it was fish, we get to the table and the entire fish is there, head to tail, literally. Later we were walking on the avenue and pass by a hospital with a bunch of cops there with their guns out and a helicopter in the air.  Get home and find out that there had been a police shooting right before we got there. On Wednesday we had our counsel for the month of August.  Lasted forever but was good, got to see old companions which is always fun. On Thursday we had district meeting and had a division with one of  the district leaders.  I also made pork chops for lunch, and we went to get a jug of water and my comp tried to put it in the sink and he hit the faucet off and water sprayed all over.  So we had to fix that, got some funny pics, when the computers start working I will send them.  And Friday was when all the miracles happened.  

So backstory.  3 months ago my comp was here in the area and did a contact with a woman who said that she would go to church and that she had a family.  He wrote down the address and it was the sisters area so he passed it to them but they never passed by the house.  So come to now.  That family was cut when the elders moved areas and the family never went to church.  But my first week in the area the husband found us on the street and told us to stop by the new house because they had moved and now things were better for them.  We wrote down the address and marked a visit.  Turns out that there are two number 8 on that street, happens a lot,  and we went to the wrong one, or so we thought.  Knocked on the door and a guy answered.  We asked if they would like to go to church with us this week and they accepted. Marked a visit for the next day and found the other house.  Went back the next day and talked to this guy, taught eternal marriage in the first lesson and he started to cry.  The next day we went there and he had invited the whole family to listen to us, walked out with 6 new investigators. Sunday they were waiting for us when we came to take them to church, they loved the church, and both have already received answers that this is the true church.  They have lots of great questions and only have to get married to baptize.  Last night we went there and they told us that on the day that we had knocked on their door the wife had come to get her things and leave.  And at that moment we knocked on the door.  So she decided to stay, and now they will have an eternal family, please pray that they will continue to grow their faith and that they can get married soon, their names are J and T.  

So that we really cool.  Also that day we had sarapatel for lunch that is basically little chopped up bits of lung, heart, kidney and tongue of pork, in blood.  Luckily the member didn’t know if we could have blood so she left it out.  Lets just say it went all right eating it until one of the missionaries pointed out the taste buds on the tongue.  We continued having dance parties on our street at night, this week there was MC Bin Laden.  Our sister missionaries were transferred without warning, they switch with ITA 1c which is the ward that I was in.  On Saturday we had 5 deserts at lunch, a cake, tapioca, mouse, ice cream and a box of chocolates.  We have 2 baptisms for this week, be praying for E and L.  But yeah that was my week, it was pretty good.  We are super tired but today is my comp´s 20th b-day so we are going to party, which means buy pizza.  Anyway, hope all is cool in Utah and that ya’ll have a great time.  Love ya, and give a hug to everyone up there.  

Elder Anderson

Transfers

Monday, July 28^th, 2014

So I got transferred, along with the rest of the mission, literally all the companionships were changed, and I ended up in a great ward-Parque Santo Antônio! A lot of the old leaders got changed and put as trainers or as cuidadors.  I am with Elder K as a zone leader still, we were both made zl at the same time, he is from Nebraska, and we are a lot alike, having a great time with him and the other two elders in our house.  This area is really cool, it has a giant favela called 'communidade fim da semana', which means weekend community, and it is huge.  My comp has been here for 4 months and still hasn’t walked all of it.  We got a really cool investigator that is stopping with almost everything in the word of wisdom.  But he has a lot of desire and even wants to serve a mission! We had some interesting lessons this week with less actives.  The craziest was an old lady that had tons of visions and had received revelation from God that she needed to leave the Mormon church for the Brazilian Christian congregation.  When we said the prayer to leave she went and got a veil to pray because in that church the men and women sit apart and the women use a veil when they pray.  So that was interesting. 

We got 14 liters of milk from a lady in the ward, no one at home drinks it so we have been trying to give it away, and finally found a family that was needing it and it was cool to hand over to them, they were really grateful.  We met a possessed guy living in a hole, literally this week, totally thought that he was going to attack my companion, but he didn’t.  We had a giant party on our street this weekend, it was actually right outside of our door, and they had a huge stage and sounds system and lights and it went until 5 in the morning for 2 nights, but now it’s over and they just got to clean up all the sin.  Besides that I have a slight cold, it’s been quite chilly lately.  But everything has been going great and this will be an amazing transfer!  Love ya’ll and have a safe trip up to UT!

Elder Anderson

1

July 21, 2014

This week I passed my one year mark!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  That was cool, to celebrate we went to the temple and had churrasco.  The rest of the week has been good.  Last week was the last time that we had to stay home because of the world cup so everyone was way excited to be out and we managed to baptize 5 people in the zone, we have been really focusing on keeping a solid number of baptisms every week and we think that things will really start picking up now.  We went out to Juquitiba this week which was a fun- 4 hours trying to sleep in a bouncy hot crowded bus, but it was cool to see it again.  Had interviews with President D this week which was really cool.  His daughter finally arrived, and his wife got robbed.  So it was a pretty interesting week for them.   We met a member from Idaho that was at the temple. He is the uncle of one of the sisters that I used to be the DL of.  Saw the missionaries from São Paulo oeste (West?) the other day, they were in our area.  We also started teaching our new pizza place, they made a free pizza for us one day, that was nice. So blessings.  Had follow up with the assistants and then we had a surprise meeting with president on Friday.  Our baptism this week is a wife of a menos activo that we are helping come back.  His brother is in the bishopric of JD Angela that I passed in a couple months ago.  The brother in law baptized her so I got to see them which was cool.  Then we had a possessed guy enter the church and start yelling during the other ward´s sacrament, so we had to help remove him.  I found out that in my previous ward the guy we baptized blessed the sacrament, had completed My Family, and was ready to go to the temple!  That was pretty cool to find out,  it’s always so cool to see your recent converts doing things in the church.  Transfers are tomorrow and I got transferred.  President is moving a lot of people around and making a lot of the old leaders trainers, he is taking one of the assistants and having him train too.  So I might get called as a trainer, which wouldn’t be that bad.  That is basically what happened this week.  Each week seems to go faster.  In president’s office there is a card with everyone´s picture and information, and they had the enter and leave dates-which they didn’t used to have, and I was looking at my zone and accidently saw my leave date, so that freaked me out, but I will let it be a surprise for ya’ll.  Hope all goes well with the move, have a great week!

Elder Anderson

More pizza

Monday, July 14, 2014

Wow! I can’t believe that this week marks one whole year!  This week was crazy because we had to stay inside three days because of the games, which was not fun.  Got a minor form of pink eye on Saturday, but I got healed.  My companion had his birthday on the 19th and a couple of members made cakes for him, which was great.  We have been trying a couple of new things on our food lately.  I have always liked a thing called farofa and farinha on my beans, but this transfer I have started putting pepper on my food too.  This week got to extremes when we took the actual peppers out and put them on our food, that was painful, but funny.  This week we got a reference of a family that has a pizza shop and we heard that they were really good. So that very night we followed up about the restoration pamphlet and ordered a pizza!!!!  Found a couple of people legally married, which doesn’t happen here, so that was sweet.  Rained for the first time in a month and that was cold, but got a good umbrella and jacket here so I stayed dry.  I finally finished my blue journal that I have had since 2006 and started the red one.  I am down to one pair of shoes now.  The first ones got so bad that I had to get rid of them.  It looked like I was wearing a green house because of the mold that was on them because it’s so wet this time of year, but the new shoes are great.  Baptized a young man in a family yesterday was pretty funny, got to go, more next week!