English class and Brazilian Money

-

 Monday, May 27, 2024; Porte Velho, Rondonia, Brazil:

This week was super busy. 

The first half of the week included lots of people not being home, not responding to our texts and calls, a lot of walking, and lots of lessons being canceled last second. 

One day we arranged to meet with one of the members here in the ward to talk about ways to help the ward. While we were talking, somehow, we got around to talking about the physical [monetary] currency of Brazil, and he showed us a large collection of current and past Brazilian currencies, coins and bills. Pretty cool. Expensive hobby though.

We visited the farthest neighborhood in our area (in the city), just an hour and a half walk to get there. 

This week some days it was super-hot, and other days pretty cold...

As I said, the start of my week was full of disappointment. But as always, the Lord blesses our efforts. The second half of the week was better. Each day we had more and more to do, more lessons and we met more people. 

Sundays can be hard to get ahold of people, and often are better used planning and sending messages to people. 

But this week, one of the members of our ward lined up some visits to do with us. We went around visiting some of the members of the ward who are struggling or haven't been able to get to church recently. We had a few lessons with people we are teaching. Afterwards Elder Pohm had 2 hours to use and had to be in a distant part of our area. So, we made some more visits to young adults in the ward to invite them to participate in institute. (Institute is the religious educational program for all adults, but it is holds religion classes at the church most specifically for young adults, ages 18-30 years old). At lots of those visits we found people or their families at home. (Often it is difficult to find people's addresses here, with the addresses being out of date or incorrect.) Then, we were invited to a family's house for dinner. They are really struggling with some super-hard problems. At the end of the dinner, I shared my favorite Scripture with them, and the spirit was super strong. Mosiah 18:9 from The Book of Mormon. 

Speaking of baptism, the Prophet Alma says that when we are baptized, we
"stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death."

I love that idea, that we stand as witnesses of Jesus Christ, by acting like Him, and becoming more like Him. 

That's my invitation to you all. Become like Christ. Be a witness of Christ. Be a light to the world!

Love y'all!

Elder David Olson
Missão Brasil Manaus

Pics-
-Elder Pohm in the middle of the humongous Amazon [brick] rainforest
-Beautiful sunset... much better through our own God-created eyes than human created cellphone camera...
-Old Brazilian money 
-Elder Pohm teaching advanced English class (Just kidding, it's the ABCs😅)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rain, General Conference, voting

-
Image
 Monday, October 7, 2024; Floresta Ward, Rio Branco, Acre, Brazil: This past week was pretty good! How was y'all's week? This week's weather was fun. It rained a few times, one of them being super-hard. The options were Rain, Sun and humidity, or clouds and smoke in the air. The rain was the best option.  One of the days that it rained we got soaked. So... I won't be using those shoes for a few days.  Sunday was like national Brazil voting day. So, we had a decent amount of rallies, car honking parades, and other campaigning happening this week. I guess someone thought that throwing small campaign cards on the ground will make people vote for their candidate... But it's required to vote here in Brazil. Even the Brazilian missionaries like my comp, Elder Santos, from other cities and states had to vote, though online. I'm still trying to figure out exactly who and what places were being voted on   but yeah. Definitely interesting to see the voting culture here....
Read more

Conference and a... Surprise!

-
Image
 Monday, April 8, 2024; Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil: Olá pessoal, tudo bem com vocês? Esta semana passada foi boa, com duas conferências, serviço, devotional e uma surpresa! Last Monday all the missionaries in Manaus had a devotional with the Manaus Temple President, President Milder. He gave a superb devotional on Jesus Christ and his Atonement for us.  Other things that happened: -We had Zone Conference this week -Tried sushi for maybe the first time... yeah, I'm not a fish guy -Did a service project for an awesome family -Some awesome sunsets this week -Lots of rain too -General Conference was interrupted by a car playing music super loud in the street As my comp and I were walking along, I subconsciously saw IT. Right after my companion pointed it out, and then my brain finally realized what it was, and I literally jumped away from it. An Iguana. This one living though. It was probably 5 feet long, with its tale being super long and skinny.  This past weekend was General...
Read more

Transfers, Faith and obedience

-
Image
 Monday, February 12, 2024; Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil: This week's letter will be short.  We had a ward barbecue-the food was awesome-and played games like Ping Pong and Uno. Because of the Lord's commandment, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints don't drink coffee. But here in Brazil there is a drink kind of similar, but also different than coffee, called Cevada. The members here drink it. Personally, I don't like drinking hot drinks in a hot climate, but it's ok. But this week we were working with one of our friends on stopping his use of Coffee and took him some Cevada to try instead. One day this week we were walking near a store and saw an older woman who had a grocery cart full of heavy things. We helped her load them into her car, said goodbye and left. Then a few minutes later her car pulled up to us on the road and she asked if we wanted a ride. In the end she saved us around 30 minutes of walking and it was on her route. God works so m...
Read more