Feliz Natal Minha Família! what´s up everybody, I hope you are
enjoying the holidays, I would like to be spending Christmas with my family
right now but not till next year haha. Strange thought next Christmas I will be
home. So yeah I was transferred :( I've missed my area in Cuiabá alot. Seems
like we never realize how good we have something until we don't have it anymore.
But I'll go where the Lord wants me to go, and so now I'm here in Campo Grande,
in the state of Mato Grosso do sul. Translation. I'm in the city of big field in
the state of thick forest of the south. Its pretty original I know. So yeah, We
had alot of complications getting here, we were supposed to leave Tuesday night
after our mission Christmas conference which was sweet. We had a good time, we
had to each recite a memorized scriptures to president and sister Reber in front of
everyone at the pulpit. I recite Ether 12:12 Pois se não houver fé entre os
filhos dos homens Deus não pode fazer milagres entre eles, portanto ele não
apareceu senão depois que tiveram fé. Yeah really impressive I know haha jk.
But we had a good time we did some skits, and ate and had a good ol' time, we
were blessed and a member named Gustavo gave me and Elder Payne a ride to the
center with all of our luggage, I was kinda stressed cause we were having a hard
time finding someone that could give us a ride to the center with all of our
suitcases cause the mission wasn't going to send us van to pick us up. But it all
worked out and I am happy for that, I was sad cause I didn't get to say goodbye to
alot of members cause we were so pressed with time last p-day and also it rained
a ton so it made it really hard to be able to visit anyone. But I hope that one
day I can at least pay a visit to industriário one day. I'm sure I will go back
to Cuiabá eventually, we will see. So we were supposed to leave Cuiabá at 8 o
clock Tuesday night, we got to the bus station late at like 7:50 and we went to
get our tickets, but they only had a bus ticket marked for Elder Moraes, and for
some reason me and Elder Payne didn't have tickets already booked in our name.
Things were kinda crazy after that cause we were trying frantically to get a
hold of the office elders but we didn't have their numbers, so I had to dig into
my suitcases to find a folder that I have that has all of the numbers for the
office Elders, meanwhile our bus left so we had already missed the bus, but now
we were stuck in the Cuiabá bus station without cell phones or anything, so
Elder Moraes had to use payphones that they had and so we got a hold of the guys
in the office finally and they sent a taxi to pick us up again, Elder Moraes
could have taken the bus since he had his ticket marked already, but he stayed
with us which was good of him. They didn't have anymore buses going to campo
grande that night and so we went back to the office elders apartments, the next
day they said that they couldn't find any buses with seats still, cause its the
holidays so everyone was traveling, so they said that we would have to wait
until Thursday morning till we would be able to leave from Cuiabá. We would
just have to bum in the office all day Wednesday, so we went to the office and
Elder Kay, one of the office Elders, found us some seats on a bus that would leave
at 7 that night, so we could leave alot earlier and get there Thursday morning
instead of Thursday night. So that's what we did we almost missed our bus again
cause we only had one really small taxi so we had to make 2 trips so I went
first with most of the baggage and with the everybodys identitie,s so that when
I got to the bus station I could give the workers their our information so that
they could get our tickets printed off and ready as soon as possible. But, the lady took foreverrrrrrrrrr! I don't know why but she took forever with our stuff,
the other guys arrived and we got all our luggage moved to where the bus was but
we couldn't board yet cause the lady still didn't have our stuff ready, so we were
getting anxious I was running back and forth Elder Moraes was staying with the
worker lady that was printing off our tickets, finally she got them printed off
and I grabbed them and ran back to the bus and we got all our stuff loaded, we
had a bunch of extra stuff that we had to bring we had all the Christmas
packages that families had sent, so we had to take it all to the missionaries in
the south it was kind of a pain, but it worked out. It was me and Elder Payne and
Elder Moraes on the bus, we didn't sleep a whole lot. I wish we could have gone
during the day cause I wanted to see all the lush greenery and trees and
wildlife, its supposed to be really pretty. Elder Payne had some sleeping pills
that he let me take which helped me sleep, we got to the halfway point and we
stopped at a bus station to take a bathroom break and get some food if we
wanted, it was about 3 in the morning and by this time the sleeping pills had
kicked in and I was walking around all woosily and drunk looking, I was having a
hard time keeping my eyes open and I was slurring my words really bad. I bought
some food and the lady was asking me some weird questions about if I wanted a
discount on the food cause we were missionaries. I was like no, no. I will just
pay like normal don't worry about giving us a discount, accept when I said it, it
was so slurred and garbled that it sounded like não não qewo sow iw pwa onbussse
não pweswiso descweconta ablah balh bal hbal hbalh bnaha blah ad ioasgha caraca.
. So yeah she didn't understand anything of what i was saying, she kept asking me
if I wanted a discount and some other stuff that I don't even remember, I was
kinda getting impatient cause she wasn't understanding me and plus our bus was
about to leave and I still hadn't paid for my food, so I was just like look my
food cost 8 reas so here's 8 reais, then I told her I was sorry cause I was
tired. I think she must have thought I was using drugs or something haha, I'll
have to explain things better if I go back north one day again. So then we got
back on the bus and I fell asleep until we got to campo grande. We got to campo
grande at about 7:30 in the morning, and one of the first things I saw when we
got into the city limits was WALMART!! I will have to go there one p-day just to
see how it is. I hear you can buy peanut butter there for like 20 bucks haha. So
President Rebers counselor was there at the bus station and he gave me and Elder
Moraes to our house, and he took care of Elder Payne's next bus ticket cause he
would have to catch another bus to Ponta Porã which is the most southern area of
our mission. The assistants said he got to Ponta porã fine, but when he got there
nobody was there to pick him up, so I don't even know what happened but sounds
like he should be good now. He's with an Argentinian now. So Here in Campo Grande
we live in a gated community that is really nice, it has soccer fields and
pavilion areas and a little track that we can run on that is right in front of
our house. We live with the assistants here, Elder Hancock and Elder Moraes. Our
flipping area is about a 50 minute walk from our house, so that s kind of a
joke, they told us to find a house to move into that is located in our area so
my first day there we found a nice green house, we checked it out, and its like
brand new and a good price, so we called the finance Secretary of the mission
and gave him the information and so sounds like he is already doing a contract
with the owners and if everything works out, we will be moving in in a couple of
weeks. yay. So we just spent these last few days getting to the know the area
and some of the members, the bad things is it rained all day yesterday and
Saturday and part of Friday, so it was really hard to do anything because it
rains really hard, even an umbrella doesn't help much. My Companion is Elder
Campos, he hit 4 months yesterday on the mission, he is 21 and is from Rio de
Janeiro. He is just as white as I am. We get along great and I look forward
to getting to know him better. Campo Grande is almost as hot as Cuiabá this time
of the year, but it is a little bit cooler I have noticed, the house here is
full of blankets which doesn't exist in Cuiabá, I got really burnt out on Friday
our Lunch was about and hour and 45 minute walk just to get to lunch. And the
sun was hot, I even burnt the scalp of my head, which just shows how thin my
hair is getting. Sunday there was 74 people at church, which is better than it
was. We are actually in a ward here, about a year and a half ago there was about
120 people going to church but there have been alot of people falling away from
the church, I feel that, that is what Heavenly Father wants us to do here is help
increase the number of people going to church. I'm excited though and I hope we
can help reactivate some people and baptize here. It seems like baptisms are
getting harder and harder for everybody, this week the entire mission only
baptized 4 people. That's because Satan is working alot harder he knows that
before long Christ will come again and so now he is giving it all that he's got.
But I'm really liking Campo Grande, its definitely a cleaner more modern city, the
roads aren't nearly as bad as the roads in Cuiabá. There are alot more planted
trees here and its just a different mission here. It doesn't look like what I'm
used to seeing. So this letter is getting too long, but I want to wish everyone
a merry Christmas. And want to thank everyone for the emails and for the
presents and money from Grandma and Grandpa Fitzgerald and Grandma and Grandpa
Kennington. i really appreciate the love that you all have and for the thoughts
and prayers. I'm excited to skype on Christmas still not exactly sure what our
plans are for the day, but I will be emailing at between 10 and 11 your time to
let you know that I'm ready to skype. But it should be great and I´m excited. Eu
espero que nesta época de Natal nós possamos lembrar de Nosso Salvador Jesus
Cristo, e que possamos lembrar do sacrifício que ele fez por nós. Sou muito
grato por ter uma família maravilhosa que me ama, oro para que nós tenhamos mais
alegria em nossas vidas e que sempre sejamos seguidores de Cristo. Feliz Natal
pra todos Amo Vocês com todo meu coração!!! Use google tanslator if you need.
Love you all! until Christmas day
-Elder Kennington Picture of me an my companion and stuff from the
Christmas conference
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