MILAGRES! (kinda)

So the end of this week was filled with miracles! Expect for when Sundayhit...So I think I mentioned last week that we've been trying to work in an area called Liberdade. It's about a 20 min onibus ride to get there which means it takes a lot of time and money to visit there as much as we want to. We have a member named Marcia there who is a little crazy but she is great with references. We marked baptism dates for two people there and visited with a bunch of others and everyone was committing to come to church but onceSunday came, nobody showed up :( The struggle is so real. 

We're working so hard and we've been contacting references like crazy and we've been marking dates for baptisms and inviting todo mundo to come to church but nothing is happening! We're trying so hard not to get frustrated. I feel so bad for Sister Wootan because she extended her mission and she feels like there's been no point. She's been fasting and praying like crazy, but nobody has been following through on commitments. We have really spiritual lessons and we've been using the Book of Mormon more and we've been extending more commitments but nobody is following through...We could really use your prayers! We only have three more weeks left in the transfer and we really really want to baptize!!

Oh but the Elders in the branch have been having success...Elders Malone e Alarcon baptized Jesus last week and he's been coming to atividades and he was confirmed yesterday. So awesome! And Elders Hidalgo and Serafico had another baptism yesterday. It was so beautiful and I cried! They've been teaching a deaf woman (Felinta) and her grandchildren (Rafaeli e Cawan?) and everyone had to talk really slow and move their mouths really clearly when talking so she could understand and it was just so spiritual and they were all so happy!

Oh and there was a time change this week and nobody told me and Sister Wootan so we showed up at church an hour early (which means that we woke up at 5h30 too) and we called all of our investigators super early to invite them again to come to church...Maybe that's why nobody showed up haha Such a fail. We were sitting in the church wondering where everyone was and we finally called Elder Hidalgo and asked what time it was and he said it was 8h instead of 9h and he said "Oh I didn't tell you guys that the time was gonna change?" No, Elder ya didn't...But oh well haha Life is good!

Oh and I made it to Mosias this week in the Livro de Mórmon! 

Eu amo vocês!

Com amor,

Sister Alia Yun Earls

Chillin on the staircase of death. It's seriously the biggest and scariest escada I've ever seen but there's a really great view

Mom! I got really homesick a while ago so I finally ate the rice and seaweed you sent me while I was in Texas

I love swingsets!

 We had to walk past this after a huge random rain storm

Carnaval, Colatina, e Bebidos

Oi!!! So this week has been insane and I'm emailing late because the Lan House was closed on Monday because of Carnaval this week and yesterday we had a zone conference in Colatina. So I'm pretty exhausted right now because we had to wake up at 12:45am yesterday to catch our first onibus and we had like 20 hours of traveling and waiting before and after the conference since we live so far away from Colatina and there were a bunch of delays because of Carnaval...But it's all good and I'm ready to finally work again today!

So last week, both pairs of Elderes in the ward had baptisms. Haha one of the people they baptized was named Jesus! And the other was Jefferson haha

So we only had Luiz Fernando at church. He's the one who has been investigating the church and coming on Sundays on and off for about 6 years, but he has a mental health problem so he doesn't have to be baptized. He doesn't want to be baptized anyways so yeah we didn't have much to work with on Sunday...We decided to try and work in Guriri and Liberdade a little this week since we had a lot of references and old investigators in those places, but we weren't able to really find anyone that we were looking for. This week was basically nothing...Everyone was traveling because of Carnaval...or they were just working or partying. We talked to a lot of drunks. We get hit on by a lot of drunk men...It's great. 

We did meet one cool guy named Luciano and he lives really close to the church, but we had to reschedule 3 times this week because things kept coming up or he just wasn't at home. It was a bummer because we made plans with Benedito (recent convert) so he could come teach with us, but they all fell through.

We've been trying to do more finding activities and we're trying to get as many addresses as we can, but nothing is working and nobody is listening or when they are, they're just not keeping commitments. 

I finsihed 2 Nephi this week in the Livro de Mórmon! My goal is to finish in Portuguese by the end of the transfer. Not sure if it's gonna happen, but it's a nice goal and I'm learning a lot :)

Eu amo vocês!

Com amor,

Sister Alia Yun Earls

Oh and Happy Belated Valentine's Day!

 

This is our church! It's on top of a gym called Academia Corpo e Mente. I think in one of my earlier emails I accidentally said it was on top of a school. Nope, it's on top of a gym that plays really loud music haha

 

Karla's baptism! She's awesome and she's already set a goal for when she'll serve a mission :) Love her!

We finally passed the beach in Guriri!!

 This is Jeorge, Venicius, e Franciele. They're a little crazy and they practice macumba (dark magic stuff? I dunno) and we've pretty much cut them but they're really funny haha

It finally rained!!! This was last Sunday morning while we were walking in Porto and trying to invite people to come to church. Sister Wootan's umbrella broke so she was killin it in her poncho ;)

 

CHUVA!

So it finally rained this week! I was so stoked! This week was really fun and we worked really hard, but nobody showed up at church again... :((((( We're trying hard to not get too discouraged. We could really use your prayers! Some investigators and members who could use some help: Vania e Felipe, Rute, Valdete, Willas, Enrique, Vitor, e Benedito. Sorry this email is short. I've been trying to send pictures but the computer is being really slow...

Eu amo vocês!

Com amor,

Sister Alia Yun Earls

 

Eu amo Sister Richards!!

 

 Eu amo Sister Richards!!

Sister Treinadoras! And Elder Giancoli (AP) in the back...Sister Vergara (on the left) went home at the end of the last transfer. And Sister Cruz (next to me) is awesome. I went on exchanges with her :) This was at our zone conference.

 

 

The Struggle

Minha gente!! Aaahh I love email time! Thanks to everyone who has been sending me emails! I love and miss you all so much!!

So I finished my first transfer in Brazil and I didn't die!!! Woohoo! Last night, we received calls from the Zone Leaders about whether we'd stay or be transferred andddddddd.......I'm still in São Mateus with Sister Wootan. So yep I'm gonna kill her. I can't believe this is her last transfer. She's pretty dang trunky. It's pretty funny.

So this week was fun and interesting and sad and scary and exciting all at the same time. A lot of things happened, but I don't have any time to write about them...I've just decided that I'm gonna have a big storytelling party at the end of my mission so I can explain all the great stuff that's been happening haha Not sure I'll actually remember half of this stuff though and I'm sure nobody wants to hear about my life anyways...Um, so yeah fun stuff, but nobody showed up at church again :(((

We're still teaching the rapazes from the BdM Praça but a lot of them just aren't keeping commitments and only Enrique and Vitor came to church that one time two Sundays ago :( We were teaching a woman who is 7th Day Adventist but she ended up dropping us this week so that was a bummer. We really could use some prayers!!!

Oh yeah something interesting...So our area has been having a water shortage and a few mornings ago, our water stopped running. We thought it was because of the water shortage so we've been seriously stressing out, but this morning we called the dona de casa and she told us that it was just the building having problems and the top apts weren't receiving water from the pipes. So someone came by this morning and fixed everything but we have to wait and run the water more because the water is still really dirty so we have to clear it out. Don't worry, we still had drinking water since we buy that separately, but today was my third day without a real shower haha No big deal. I'm only a little smelly ;) Not really haha We just used water that we had luckily stored in soda bottles (we were using them as weights to keep our doors open) and washcloths and wipes. It was like doing trek again. Not gonna lie though, my hair is pretty gross haha But we get to shower for reals tonight!!!

So this week I've been studying Christlike Attributes in Preach My Gospel and I've been focusing a lot on charity, diligence, and patience. I've really learned a lot of patience so far on my mission. I'm so grateful for this chance to be a missionary :)

Eu amo vocês!

Com amor,

Sister Alia Yun Earls

Moroni 7:45-48

Also, sorry I've been hardcore slacking on sending photos but I'll try to be better next week! It's just so hard because I want to respond to everyone and then I don't have any time to send photos!