November 15, 2010 - Bom Dia!

Hey Family!

How´s everything going? Sounds like you guys are all doing well. I´m doing good also. Thanks for the pictures. Kate is big! Haha thats so awesome. Hope everything is well with them.

 

Rachel - I forgot to tell you that your hair looks great! Its a lot longer now. And nice job on the pumpkin. If i´m right its the beach. Man you´re good. Are you planning on going to the beach this year or something haha? How is tennis? School? What happened with the callbacks? Hope all is well. How´s those scripture mastery coming? Read the scriptures and pray everyday!

 

Dad - How´s work going? and the ward? What else is new?

 

Mom - How´s the calling? and the stake youth committee? Glad to hear that training was good.

 

Questions:

Tell us how many hours a day you walk and how the weather is.  

     The weather is hot! Its wierd how the weather is hot but Christmas is almost here. It has rained a lilttle bit but not too much. From what I understand it will start raining a lot soon. We walk a ton each day. I´ll have to do an experiment where i time myself walking. Its hard to say.

 

Tell us what your favorite Brazilian snack food is. 

     Hmmm...as far as candy goes they have something called bis, which is similar to a kit-kat that is good. They have these oreo-like cookies but like a key lime flavor that i like haha.

 

Tell us how many investigators do you have.  How many lessons a week do you teach? 

      Right now we´re working a lot with our recent converts just helping them to stay active. We are teaching one woman/girl named Vánia. She is 21 and is really good. She is the niece to another investigator (Gilberto) and lives with him. Gilberto is still working on getting married but still wants to be baptized. Vánia wanted to know more and so we taught her. She will hopefully be baptized this week. We´re working with her on the Word of Wisdom a little bit but she liked church a lot this last week. We are looking for more people who have a strong desire to teach right now. We teach close to 30-40 lessons a week (but a lesson doesn´t necessarily mean one of the lessons from PMG). We have to walk a ton and we are struggling in teaching with members. Not a whole lot of involvement with the members right now.

 

 Do you take turns during the lesson teaching?  

   Yup. We normally each teach half of the lesson.

 

Do the people treat you nice or are they rude to you? 

    Most people are pretty nice. Every once in a while you talk to somebody who is mad at the world and there isn´t too much you can do. But for the most part people are nice.

 

 Do they ever talk so fast that you can't keep up?
     Everyonce in a while i have to ask them to repeat or ask my comp, but for the most part I understand well. Sometimes people don´t understand me very well and I have to try again or my companion takes over for a bit. I think its my accent, which will improve with time.

 As far as the letters go, just keep sending emails. I can print them i found out today. Email is better because its FAST haha. But thanks for the concern and ideas.  2 packages for Christmas?!/!? Man am i lucky haha thanks a ton. I´ll look forward to getting them. There´s going to be a mission conference the week of Christmas where the whole mission will be together in Ribeirão Preto. It should be awesome! We have a zone conference this week also. I´m excited for that.  They are always good. Transfers are next week. I could go or stay and the same with Elder D Souza. We will see. Both ways will be good. Today after emailing we are going to hike this hill that overlooks the whole city with a priest in the branch here. There is a statue of Christ there, typical of almost every hill in Brazil haha. But it should be cool and I promise to take some good pictures.

But im doing good. I´m healthy and im still liking the food. I really like beans and rice. Many times they eat "macarrão" with beans and rice. It is just a word for pasta and spaghetti sauce haha. Its really good all mixed together with a piece of fried chicken. The only thing that i´ve eaten thats wierd was "moella". Its some internal part of the chicken. I dont have my dictionary with me otherwise I would look it up. I knew it was different just by looking at it. It was cut up in a mixture of food. I just ate it. It wasnt too bad but i wouldnt choose it. The member told me that she only made it because her husband likes it and that she doesn't even like it. She told me i didnt have to eat more of it if i didnt want to and was super nice. 

I´m proud to represent the Lord every day. I have things I need to do better, but we all do. The important thing is to look to improve and set goals. This week I learned and will continue to learn about diligence. Diligence truly brings a feeling of satisfaction. Its easy to want to do nothing or less important things. But when we do the hard thing or the thing that needs to be done, we will be more happier. The gospel is the plan for our happiness. Keep doing what you guys need to do to be happy (Mosiah 2:41). 

I love you all so much. Thank you for your love and support. I hope you are happy. I am happy. This is the important stuff, the stuff that matters!

 

Elder Hawkley

November 8, 2010

Hey family,

Well we have another baptism this week and 4 confirmations. It was a good week. We baptized Fúlvia. She is 12 and is the sister of Daniel, who we baptized last week. I baptized the 4 last week and Fúlvia this week. I also confirmed 2 people. One of the kids, Richard (9), was cranky at chruch haha. He didnt want to be confirmed. He didnt want to listen to anyone haha. I was able to confirm him, barely. I didnt have time to give him a blessing, just gave him the holy ghost haha. He was trying to remove my hands from his head. These kids have nothing and no role models. But the holy ghost will help them through their lives. That was our greatest motivation for them. My intent was to attach a picture of the baptism haha, but somewhere I made a mistake. I will attach the pictures of the two. I havent been taking too much pictures, but I probably have more than you think haha. I will try to do better there too. Thanks for the letters and the pictures, and for the package for Christmas!. 

I´m doing well right now. Things are going good.  I´m happy and proud to be a missionary serving the Lord. Things are super good with my comp. He helps me a lot through the hard days. He is a good example to me. We have transfers here in 2 weeks. Time really is flying. The days are long, but the weeks go quick.

As a missionary I´ve learned a lot about how critical the members are in missionary work. We don't have a ton of support from the members here in Leme, but are working hard to help them help us. Missionaries need people to bring investigators to church, to be a friend to investigators, to teach lessons with, and last but NOT least, to feed them haha just kidding. But really please do all you can to support the work. Without the members the work is much more difficult and less effective. Make a goal to give a pass a long card a week or something. Don't be afraid. D&C 68:5-6. The Lord will be with you. The most they can do is say no. Remember that the gospel is a blessing in our lives and that other people need that blessing too. 

I love this gospel, I love being a missionary, and I love you all more than I can write. Stay strong and safe and happy!

 

Elder Hawkley

These pictures were taken of the baptisms last week.  The little girl on the far left in the first picture, I think, is a from a member family.  The other four were their investigators.

 This was from the baptism they just had.  Her name is Fulvia.

November 1, 2010

Hey Family!

Well we had 4 baptisms this week! We baptized Christina (18), Lais (12), Richard (11), and Daniel (11). Christina is a girl I contacted on the sidewalk outisde her house. She already has an 8-month old boy and is not married. She is super awesome and we talked a lot about the temple during teaching and she is super excited to go the temple and wants to marry there someday. Lais and Richard are brother and sister and Daniel is their cousin. They all live together. Their mom´s have been inactive in the church for a long time. Their moms drink "pinga" (alcoholic drink) all day long, and their dad is in jail. Its super sad. The mom of Lais and Richard is 4 months pregnant and just drinks all day long, without eating or drinking water. We´re doing our best to help them, but they have to want to stop. Thats whats hard. The kids are awesome and the church will save them. The baptismal service was good. A little girl in the branch was also baptized. Richard was super scared. The first time his foot came up and he did not want to do it again. Eventually we were able to baptize him haha. It was a little stressful for me haha. We had the baptism immediately after church sunday. The only thing i didnt like was that it felt super rushed. Lunch is the big meal here (not sure why haha they eat the same thing for dinner haha) and you could tell that everyone was ready to leave. But it was good.

 

Questions:

Tell us about the city where you are and what the people do for a living. 

   The city of Leme is a big area for only two elders and so we walk a lot haha. As far as what the people do for a living I don´t really know too much. There´s a pop factory here thats pretty big and some people work there.

What kind of stores are around there? 

    They have all kinds of stores. Lots of little stores with a specific thing. They really like shoes here. The shoe stores are massive haha

 What do you do on pdays? 

     Today we got a haircut and after this we will buy groceries. After that we go home, clean the house, do laundry. I write a letter or two. Then its time to work again haha.

 Any adventures or outings? 

    Not yet. Theres a hill close by with a statue of Christ that we may go hike one pday. 

 

As far as the package goes I´ll let you guys surprise me. Vitamins: so a thing of vitamin c and zinc. Ideas: Laffy taffy, granola bars, honey roasted pnuts, beef jerky, a small thing of twizzlers (my current comp like them. I dont know if we will be together, but you could throw in a little thing of them just in case). I would like a narrow click pen. 

 

Well things are going good. We are working hard. Something funny is that for a meal to be a "meal" in brazil it has to have rice and beans. Anything else: hamburger, pizza, etc is only a snack haha. I love you guys a ton. Thanks for your example and support. Stay strong and live the gospel.

 

Rachel - congrats on the talk. Hows school and tennis? Keep up the good work! I love you

 

Love,  Elder Hawkley 

October 25, 2010

Hey Family!

  Things are going better for now. It definitely was a tough week. But i got the package and i think 6 letters from people! They were sent a while ago haha. Thanks for the package and everything in it. I am enjoying  the snacks! Ideas for the christmas package: krazy glue, toothbrush, pen( narrow with a click top), 1 thing of those zinc tabs (nice for when sick, but im healthy), 1 more thing of vitamins, 1 thing of melatonin, granola bars, uno, the same snacks as last time. mints/gum, and 2 blue refils for my marking pencil. I´ll let you guys decide what you want to send me. I really liked all the snacks you included in this last one! I would send the package 6 weeks before you want me to receive it. You can send it this week or wait a week and i´ll let you know if i think of anything else.

    We´re working hard and we may have some baptisms this week! We are teaching some kids in a less active family and also an 18 year old girl named Cristina. We´re going to work hard to help them get baptized this week.

   Glad to hear the trek went well. Sounds like it was a great experience for all who went. This week we had a random guy give us a ride to one of our appointments. Nice, right. When we got there he told us that the book of mormon wasnt true and that we should go home. I wanted to laugh in his face. I bore my testimony and we left. If anything it strengthened my testimony even more. Satan is working hard against and always will be. It will be hard at times, but this is the work of the Lord and the only true church on the earth in our day. The Church of Jesus Christ! Live it to the fullest and you will be blessed. Happiness lies in living the gospel. I am so blessed to have you guys as my family. I love you so much! Keep me updated. I will write more next week. I promise haha!

 

Elder Hawkley

October 18, 2010

Hey family!

I´ll start with the questions.

 

Questions -

We would like to send your Christmas package in the next couple of weeks.  Anything special you would like? 

       I can´t think of too many things right now. I will think more and let me know before you send it.

Did you get the package?  If not, you might want to ask the Mission Office to call the Post Office and see if it is sitting there waiting to be picked up or something.  Hopefully you won't have to pay a fee to get it.
   Haha no package yet. If I don´t get it this week at district meeting I´ll call the mission office.

How is the teaching going?
    The teaching is going good. We are trying to find good investigators. Many times we find somebody, teach a good lesson, and then the next week they don´t want to be taught anymore (hiding from us haha). But we are just looking and teaching. This week at church we didnt have any investigators so that was a bummer. But we will press on!

Tell us about the branch you are in.
   The branch is good. We are trying to get the members more involved through splits and better branch activities. This last week there was 67 people in attendance, which is pretty average. But there are over 700 people baptized here in Leme haha. The list of less-actives is a BOOK haha.

What do you do on Pdays?  (besides write to us! ha ha)

    Pday we clean the house, do laundry, buy groceries. Not too much. Normally I am trying to organize things or write in the journal. We just rest in our house. Its good though. I always look forward to pday.

 

Well I know it was short, sorry! But I love you all very much and i will write more next week! I´m doing good here in Leme. Hope all is well there!

 

Elder Hawkley