New Shoes.......and Great Pizza!!

"First, I have to say that I have never received a better package than the shoe package! My bishop here passed by the mission home while he was in Campinas and picked up my package. That was after I had called Pres. Castro Deus and asked for permission. It was pretty awful walking around in strong rain with a hole in my shoe. Thank you for the socks, insoles, shoes and candy. Oh, and I'm sure that Elder Rossi will be grateful for the jerky seasoning. I'm certain that he can find someone in Brasilia that can translate the instructions for him.

This week was eventful. Saturday night we, together with Elder Clark and Elder Bradford, did a Musical Fireside. It was actually an activity for their ward and was part of the open house we did, but this open house involved the entire city, so we worked on it together (even though my ward didn't show up or pitch in, neither did the bishop announce it, so nothing good happened for our ward!). It was fun, because I played the piano for their choir and on Sunday I had to go to their sacrament meeting to play the piano, too. That made me feel good to do something that I was good at for them.

This week was crazy as well. The pizza here in Vinhedo is SUPER GOOD. We ate pizza five times this week...one to celebrate the transfer, one because we had another elder over on a division and three more. lol, oh well! It's prett nutty with four Americans. We laugh a lot , and just like the last time I lived with my ZLs, I think that I'm the only sane one in the house.

Here in Vinhedo we are trying to start from scratch. For that entire transfer with Elder Hancock we were working with old investigators that they had with his previous companion. Well, those people were going nowhere very, very slowly, so we dropped just about everybody and are trying to find new people. That is why these weeks have been so hard. I've never started with a clean slate before. I'm learning a lot. Those two women you asked about are hard to reach. Ana Maria, the one with the super nice house has been living in Sao Paulo these past few weeks, so I haven't even been able to talk to her again, though I call her everyday. I am praying hard that one of these days when I call her, she'll be home. Ivone is almost the same way...rich people are difficult. We're starting a new program of cards here in the ward with 48 little displays that we are putting around the city that hold pass along cards, so I expect we'll get a lot of references from this once it gets started. Also, this was the first week when I succeeded in marking for members to teach with us everyday. I'm happy, but yesterday and the day before didn't work out, so cross your fingers for the rest of the week.

I love you guys. Tell Tiffany that I'm proud of her because she is active in the church and doing well in high school.

Tchau! Ate mais! Elder Christian