Answers to questions I asked Alina; (Dad)

1) Sister Rodrigues was baptized when she was like 9 years old with her mom and brother, but they went inactive quickly and she returned to the church by herself about 4 or five years ago, so shes the only active member in her family! Its been good, because she has experiences and understands the perspective of some things of investigators that I dont get. 

2) We watch all of them of course!!! I looooove conference! Too good foreals! I'll never forget how Presidente Uchtdorf was crying about that british mans talk about refuges. I wanna know what he was thinking, man!

3) Dont worry hahhaha we always have the Liahonas in portuguese and english, so i'll pick one up from the mission office in a few week or our zone leaders will bring them to a zone conference in a few weeks. 

I shared that story with Danielle this week about you in the store!  

My old companion Sister A. Santos is from Belem, Brazil so I know she is pumped that theres going to be a Temple there! I think they generally always had to drive like 9-12 hours away for a Temple, so thats going to be a huge blessing for them! So exciting!! Conference really just is the best! Loved it!!!!! Its always fun for us too as missionaries to see all the other missionaries and spend the day being spiritually rejuvenated and not walking so much in the hot sun for a couple of days. Yesterday it was in the mid 30's, celcius of course, and not a cloud in the sky. I've gotten used to being sweaty literally ALWAYS so thats fun, but wow I'm almost excited for winter, though winter in Santos is actually just a joke and doesnt ever get trully chillly hahahhaha! Love it! 

In reply to Mom's letter:

1) My favorite talks I dont even know!!! I LOVED Presidente Uchtdorfs talk about repentance and coming back to the fold of Christ! But honestly I just loved it all! It's hilarious how on the mission its been a completely different experience where I'm just glued to the screen and don't even notice that two hours have suddenly passed! I loved Elder Hollands talk at the end too because it was literally right in the moment when I was so sad thinking about how I wished we had General Conference every weekend and just didnt want it to end.

2) I think a lot of the members watch it in their homes, but the Stake really encourages them to go to the Stake Center to watch it and so theres a good number of people that go there (the majority for the Sunday Morning session hahhaaha) and thats where all of as missionaries go to watch as well, all of the missionaries serving in the stake of São Vicente, especially since we are supposed to take investigators to watch with us as well. Its really nice too because they set up a tv in an upper room for all the english speaking missionaries to watch us well so I got to watch in English which is so nice! I understand Portuguese, but it is always just so much nicer to hear in your native language and hear the actual voices of the speakers and their expressions. We as English speakers should never take for granted how lucky we are to have that and not to have the problems that sometimes happen as translators are dubbing over the english and technology and everything gets wacky sometimes. The Brazilian portuguese and technology for them Saturday was terrible, but luckily got all worked out for Sunday.

3) Danielle liked it a lot and said she had a lot of big answers to her prayers and questions like we said she would. Woohoo!!!:) And yes, thats her in the white dress at her baptism with us and yes she is BEAUTIFUL. She even said she's considering a mission and that it's something she'll pray about. SHE WOULD BE SUCH A GREAT MISSIONARY!!!! Love that girl foreals. 25 years old and a only been a member for one week and she watched all 4 sessions of conference and the womens session with us. Whats the excuse that some members who've been members for 20 years have? We also had a less active who's returing go to all the sessions too. Kawê is his name and oh hahahah what a special child that I'll have to tell you all about later. I gave your email to him to send some selfies he took of us to you and dad so hopefully you'll get those soon! 

5) Easter we worked as normally! Hahahah trying to talk about the resurrection with everyone! Its just sad though that for holidays, even Easter, the night before everyone just gets together to drink. Brazilians pretty much are ready to party at whatever moment and whatever day they dont have to work theyre drinking and dancing hhahahha

6) I''ll be praying for all of them!Haha

7) Yeah I heard about the bombing because Danielle and then some members told us all about it! It's true that I am thankful that terrorist attacks arent too common here hahaha but armed assaults in the street are way more common so you take what you can get, right?;) Promise that I've never been robbed or assaulted, though it is something that happens all the time here (stop worrying Mooooom), but I think people honestly treat us better knowing that we're missionaries of God. Something that Brazil does respect is God, so thats nice!

9) The shoes are in the mission office watiting for me for sure! 

For me it was just yesterday! I forget that I have almost 8 months (WHAT) in the mission and that life changes on the outside. Coming home is going to be WEIRD. 

Life is good and I'm eating good and happy and loving life!