March 27, 2017 - Belo Horizonte, Guarani area

I see a Belo Horizonte

This week was a short week as last week we had p-day on Tuesday. We ended up making some breaded chicken, onion rings and ranch. It had been a long time since I had eaten ranch, as it does not exist here. 

The next day we had a Split with the Zone leaders and I was paired up with Elder Silfies. He´s another Elder from my group. I hadn´t really talked with him much before and it was nice to get to know him. Unfortunately, almost nobody seemed to be home, but we were able to teach a first lesson and they had a ward activity, Candy Bomber. We watched a little video and then they threw candy at us.

The next day was our only normal day this week and we were just working and trying to follow up with all of our investigators. By the end of the day we were rather tired.

On Friday we had Rosemeire´s baptismal interview. It was a success and everyone was happy. 

Saturday we had our English class, which has a pretty good group of people going now and they want to learn. A lot of people here take extra English classes and they place more importance on learning other languages. We are kind of slacking in the U.S. 

After that we filled up the font, arranged the room and got everything ready. Elder Namauu and Dantas wanted to make a cake while we waited for the font to fill up. I have never seen a font fill up so slowly. We had a successful baptism and everyone went to the 'manly cake boss.'

In the 'manly cake boss' only the men could make the cakes. There was a competition to see which one was the best with women judges. Wives could not be judges, and the Elder´s cake won third place. The other Elders got really excited. 

Sunday was rather calm with a confirmation and Elder Namauu and I were very tired. Just fighting to make it to p-day.

Just thought that everyone should know that today is my moms birthday. I love her.

abraço

Elder Quain

Rosemeire´s baptismal interview

 Rosemeire´s Baptism

 Manly Cake Boss Activity

 Splits with the Zone Leaders

March 21, 2017 - Belo Horizonte, Guarani area

I see a Belo Horizonte

This week was rather full. We had Zone conference, and a ward activity.

To start off we had a zone conference and I got to see a lot of other missionaries. All of my old companions that are still in the mission were there. President Fernandes talked quite a bit about our ability to choose. He made a comparison that I really liked and want to share with you.

He compared our life to an airplane flight. He gave us the ability to choose where we wanted to go, which plane, the duration of our visit and where we sat on the plane. Then we got into the plane and halfway through the flight we wanted to get out of the plane. We all know what would be the effect of trying to leave a plane in mid flight. But, why would we want to leave. We chose the plane, our seat, we accepted everything.  Are the plane walls too confining? To leave now would be suicide... 

In this life we accepted our conditions. Even though we don´t remember, before this life we lived with God and he presented us the plan of salvation. We accepted it. Why would we want to leave now? Are the commandments too restrictive? To leave now would be spiritual suicide.

This week we also had a ward dessert competition. Elder Namauu and I made passion fruit mousse. Unfortunately, we didn´t win anything, but our dessert was the first to disappear. So I think the judges were a little biased against the missionaries. They can´t let two Americans win against Brazilians.

We are teaching a lot of people, but the investigator that is progressing the most is Rosemeire. She´s come to church many times and has a baptismal date for this week. She seems really excited for the Baptism.

Questions answered:

1. So, how are your pipes? Are things fixed and working better? Yeah, we were able to get them all fixed and now we have water pressure. So, that´s always a plus.

2. Tell me more about your English class. We had a few more people come to this last session and things are going rather well. We even have a few nonmembers and less actives going.

3. How are you and Elder Namauu getting along? We are getting along well and are working together rather well. At times he reminds me a little of Spencer, so that can be kind of funny.

4. Who else is in your apartment? Names, where from? Elder Dantas. He is from São Paulo and is a nice guy. He only has 3 more weeks on the mission, so he is thinking about home a little bit, but who can blame him. Elder Florencio. He is from the south of Brasil, where it is like a mini Europe. As he is darker, a lot of people don´t believe that he is actually from the south. He is really chill and a funny guy.

5. What’s your ward like? This is the largest ward that I have served in and they are fairly supportive. A lot of the people just seem to want to help. We receive quite a few references, so that helps us a lot.

6. What’s the city like? The city is good. We live next to the grocery store and bakery and here has pretty much everything that we need. It’s not super hilly, but it is definitely not flat. I shouldn´t be gaining any weight here with these hills.

Abraço

Elder Quain

 Zone Conference

 view from my apartment window

March 13, 2017 - Belo Horizonte, Guarani area

I see a Belo Horizonte

Well this week I decided that I had to buy new shoes. My seventh pair on the mission. Monday it was raining quite a bit and the water kept coming into my shoes. I can still use them on normal days, but I have a new pair for when it is raining. 

Tuesday it didn´t rain, but we were out doing visits when the rent lady called us saying our water storage box on top of our house broke and overflowed. We had to come back home and clean up a good amount of water, but we got lucky and none of our books or beds were wet.

Wednesday we finally had a normal day of work which continued until Saturday when we taught an English class. It was the first in this ward and didn´t have too many people, but was rather fun. We taught them the Alphabet song and we sang together. People started laughing at me when I got mixed up and started singing it in Portuguese. 

That night we had a ward baptism of a primary kid. We got there and they were having a bridal shower that had a lot of food left over, so we got some hot dogs and chicken salad. After eating we were going to the baptism and noticed that the font was empty. So we filled it up as fast as possible using buckets and hoses to speed up the process. Luckily, the kid was pretty short, so we didn´t have to fill it up very high.

I had been asked to give my testimony for the ward this Sunday. When I arrived they told me that one of the people who had been marked to speak didn´t show up. So, I got to give a full blow talk. Unfortunately, the sound wasn´t working very well so not every heard everything. After that we got to teach the youth how to talk about the gospel with there friends. The secret is bear a simple and true testimony.

Well, that all for this week

Abraço

Elder Quain

old photo of Elder Namauu, Elder Higashi and me on transfer day​

 Our English card that we give out.

Literal translation: "Do you want to learn English?

We have a class given by two Native American professors"

I thought that was pretty funny.​

Cleaning our flooded house, about 2cm of water across the floor. Elder Quain's tag phrase,

"We preach, we teach, we serve, and we just try to survive."

March 6, 2017 - Belo Horizonte, Guarani area

I see a Belo Horizonte

Well, this was my first week in Guarani. I said bye to Sevilha and traveled a whole thirty minutes to my new area. But, I finally entered into the big city. I am now in Belo Horizonte, the Capital of Minas Gerais. The church is better established here and I think the ward has the highest frequency of any of the other wards that I have served in.

My new companion is Elder Namauu. He is a Hawaian that was born in Germany and lives in Baltimore, Maryland. He has about 4 months on the mission and is excited and ready to work. We are one of the two All-American companionships in the mission. The funny thing is that I think he might be even taller tha me, so we feel like giants. We get quite a few looks as two tall, white Americans walking through the streets of Brasil. 

We have quite a big teaching pool right now and I am just trying to learn everyone's name and how to get around here. These city streets are a lot more confusing than the countryside I´m used to. But there are a lot of good people. One even had a birthday this week (Bel) and invited us to attend. They had food there, so it was an obvious ye. 

I should have more to write about the area next week, but that all for now folks.

Abraço

Elder Quain

Elder Quain & Elder Namauu at Bel's birthday