Brazil Week #46

Olá  peoples bom dia. Today its rainy and cloudy, which is kinda stinky. Its been like that alot during this week. Not much at all this week. I went on splits a few times and caught a fair amount of rain. Its kinda hard working in the rain here. cause no one is in the streets and it seems like everyone just goes to sleep when its cloudy and raining. But I guess rain does that, it kinda puts you in that relaxed sleep mode. But we were able to get some good lessons in this week. Tuesday Elder Cardona came here to Industário and we had splits and Elder Almeida went to the area next to ours called Pedra 90. SO it was kind of a bum day because it was raining and pretty junky weather. We went and tried to contact a referral, but the lady wasn't home so we went to member in the ward that is less active sort of and is from Bolivia, Elder Cardona is from Bolivia so we spent a while there listening them talk about Bolivia and stuff in Spanish. IT was fine though I understood what they were saying. We were getting ready to leave after this and then the sisters daughter arrived and so we started talking more again. Her daughter just turned 17 but she has a baby of about 2 months. We talked for a little bit and she related about how alot of members and turned their back on her cause she had made a mistake and got pregnant and stuff. But it was good we were able to help them and strengthen them. They went to church yesterday which was good. So we had a confusion this week with the Elders this week that has kinda put Elder Almeida in a bad mood with them. We had two investigators that are pretty solid one is a young woman of 17 and the other a young man of 16. So the girl Elder Almeida had already taught several times but she was traveling for almost 2 months and so he didn't get to teach her for a while, but he called on Tuesday and she had just arrived back at home so we sent up an appointment to go there, but the other Elders went there as well for some reason and started teaching her and marked a baptismal date with her and there was also another investigator of ours there that is the young man who we had also marked an appointment with him to teach him, but by chance he was there too and they taught him as well and marked a baptism date with him as well. We were kinda like what the, cause the other Elders are teaching our investigators that live in our area that we had already been teaching and had already marked visits with them and now all of the sudden the others are teaching them and marking baptisms with them. So it has kinda been confusing this week. Ive been chill cause as long as the people get baptized by someone I'm happy, but there's always that missionary pride of no my baptism its mine I want the credit! Stuff like that but Elder Almeida is in his last 3 weeks and would like to go home baptizing so he's a little more fired up about it than me. Its been pretty tense with him and the zone leaders but its better now after church. Its kind of a complicated situation. I'm keeping my mouth shut though, I have a super good relationship with the zone leaders and the missionaries in our mission and I'm not going to do anything to complicate that or put hard feelings between anyone. So I'm just gonna ride the waves and let Almeida take care of it haha. So also we haven't been able to teach mayara that other young women cause she has been traveling with her family this week. We are working with a family of a lady that was baptized last transfer but started living with a guy like 2 weeks after her baptism, so we are working to get them married and then get her husband baptized cause he has already gone to church several times. We had several family home evenings this week which was nice. Something interesting My first Sunday here we were at church greeting the members as they came in and we saw some really dark skinned guys walking in the streets walking they passed by and I thought man we should have waved at them to come to church. But then a few seconds later another one walked by, I guess me and the other missionary had the same prompting cause we both waved him over at the same time. He came into the church and we talked to him for a bit, he was like yo hablo espanhol, it said that like 5 times. So I talked to him a little bit in spanish and explained what was up. But that was hard cause I don't remember spanish very good, the guy was from Haiti. He watched all the classes even though he said he didn't really understand anything. The next week he came to church again which surprised me. We also found out the he was already a member of the church and him and all of his family were baptized back in Haiti. So the church is helping him find a job and a place to live because he has to leave his house tomorrow and find somewhere cheaper to live and a job as well. We got some food for him as well that a family put together, they found his records and stuff and now the church is helping. It sounds like he spent 4,000 dollars just to come to Brazil and get all his documents in order and stuff. And now he's here and doesn't even have a secure job or place to live. So I thought that it was cool that we were able to help him recognize the church and get help, he's gone to church 3 times in a row now here even though he doesn't understand very much he knows that he is in the same church the he was baptized in back in Haiti. Well a whole lot of not much this week I hope weather is better this week, Last p-day we didnt do much either we just went to a members home and ate lunch and bummed there for a while. we also had family home evening that night and had Brazilian hots dogs which is French bread with chopped up hot dogs in a tomato mixture thing Its really good and we eat a ton of it here in Brazil and is one of my favorite foods I will send you a picture of it. Today we wanted to go to the Chapada which is a major tourist attraction here in mato grasso. Its like an hour and a half from cuiabá I think, a brother was going to take us but today the weather is looking bad so maybe we will save it for another pday. I know that the assistants are taking a bus with a bunch of other missionaries today to go to the chapada but we were just going to go with the member, because it would be cheaper and faster and we would get to see more as well. Maybe next week though. Today I want to make sweet rice, ill see if there is time or not. oh yeah mom asked about my companion in the picture that's him laying down. He's pretty much as white as I am. He from the south of Brazil which has lots of immigrants from Germany and Europe, and so there is alot of white people there. So usually people ask if I'm from the south of Brazil because there is alot of white people down there. Also this week I went to pedra 90 which is the area next to ours and went on a division with Elder Linton who is from my group and is a good friend of mine. We visited a few people and taught a lady there. That couldn't understand the role of prophets and was convinced that we were all prophets spreading the word of God. I explained several times but she couldn't understand but still she was like oh yeah Ill go to church on Sunday. I forgot my bible back at the house and I regretted it cause I needed to use it several times during the lesson. I want to go to the mission office so that I can buy a smaller bible tat doesn't weigh so much, it gets tiring sometimes carrying around the bible and books of Mormon all day in the pack. We stayed the night there in pedra 90 with the missionaries, Elder Almeida was in pedra 90 as well and did a division with Elder  Cardona. They have a big house that used to have 4 missionaries, but now only has 2. So they only had 2 mattresses so we put them both together and all four of us slept on the same mattress, it was weird but worked out ok. So happy birthday to Uncle Randy last week and happy birthday to Jordan on Wednesday. And happy birthday to everyone else. I left my calendar that mom made me in sorriso that had all of the birthdays of everyone. I am trying to get it back but we will see. Also congrats to Kaden for making the basketball team again. That's really cool and I know that he will do well, to bad I didn't have the skills like him to make the basketball team haha good for him though. Also if you do decide to send a little package or something I am in need of more good socks, and stick deodorant cause here they don't have stick deodorant and the spray deodorant that they have is really expensive. But I know mail is expensive so don't worry to much. Also more green ties would be good. haha But i think that's about it this week I've tried to stretch this letter out for you guys so that you have something to read. Also I got another postcard from Grandma Dale this week that was really cool. I put it in my photo album to show people. I included a picture of us and a family on pday when they took us out to eat, this is a really neat family of Gustavo and Fabiani that are members here, at this place we bought like a 100 little meat pastries that they bake and they bring them out and we just eat it was really good. SO I guess that's about it I love you guys thanks for the letters and the advice, things are good here and we have some lofty goals this week so we are going to be working hard. Thanks again for everything and for all your prayers and thoughts. Also we had the time change 2 weeks ago so I'm not sure what time it is for you guys now. Right now its almost noon here. But love you guys so much and hope you all have a great week! Abração! 

-Elder Kennington