April 8, 2013

Well, well, well. I arrived in Mossoró finally. It was a horrible transfer, but now I am here and things can only get better. It is way hot, but I don't think it is any worse than Caicó. Once your skin feels like it is sizzling it is hard to tell the difference. There is usually a breeze here though so it is bearable. It is a bigger city for sure. My area is about the same size as the ones I have already been in though. Well maybe a little smaller. We are in a ward called Urick Graff with another companionship of sisters that also live with us. It's 3 Americans and my companion Sister Ribeiro that is from Rio de Janeiro. Yeah, she was freaking out about the temple. Everyone was. It is super exciting. I was SUPER excited to hear about the one in Cedar too. They deserve a temple there. But yeah, second companion in a row from Rio. I will be talking like a "carioca" in no time. They have a nice slur on all their s's. My new comp. Sister Ribeiro is 28 and has been a member for like 10 years, but was inactive for a while. She talks SO much. Like nonstop, the whole day. I am adjusting though. She has the Rio de Janeiro attitude, sort of a diva, but not in a prissy way. We have warm water here, but just because it bakes in the sun all day so the water in the whole city is warm. Cold water doesn't exist here. I am kind of missing my cold showers though because when you're hot a hot shower doesn't feel good.

 I am in the Natal mission right now, but there are still 2 transfers before the divide so I could easily be switched. There are a bunch of new sisters coming the next transfer so just about everyone will need to train and a bunch of areas will be opened up. It is way chaotic. There have also been a bunch of emergency transfers recently because of Americans getting their visas and coming in the middle of a transfer. 

The pictures I am sending are of the sisters in our zone with one of the recent converts here. My comp. is the tall skinny girl with an afro on the left. I am learning that black girl hair is a nightmare to style, or as you call it in Portuguese "cabelo crespo."

 

 

The other picture is part of our zone. Sister Hunt (sitting to the right of me) and Sister Johnson (in the corner looking at the wall) are the ones who live with us.  Our district leader is the one on the far left that looks super GQ. He is from the south so he is way fancy. Next to him is our zone leader Elder Ortega (who now changed his name to Elder Pruneda... yeah, didn't know you could do that in the middle of your mission but apparently you can) and he served with me a couple weeks in Pombal so it is cool to serve with him again. 

The other picture is the super fancy lunch we had the other day. The guy works at a restaurant so he was all about presentation. I hadn't eaten a lunch that fancy my whole mission. The members really love sister missionaries here. It's super awesome. I hope I don't get fat because of all the good food. I have also been eating a ton of açai. It is so delicious. Do they have it in Utah? Because I will really miss it when I get back if they don't. 

 

I watched conference and loved it. The first session I watched in Portuguese and actually understood everything. Wow, I've come so far. Then the other 3 they put all the American missionaries in a room together to watch in English, it was sweet.

 

The following are some pictures from Pombal. I really miss Sister Alves.

Also, our mission finally got word that we can e-mail friends. I still only have an hour to e-mail, but if my friends want to e-mail me they can. laurel.udy@myldsmail.net 

Until next week!

Love, Sister Udy