Date: Wed, Dec 29, 2010 at 12:34 PM
Subject: Texas Week 7?
Oi Todo Bem querido Familia!
Hoje, eu recebo um email desde Teresina Brasil missao.
Today, I received an email from Teresina Brasil Mission, although my Portuguese isn't nearly good enough to be able to know what it says exactly but it is talking I think about packages and calling families and what not... Not exactly sure. I might get my visa soon too, middle of January is the rumor we heard from another Brasil-going missionary who just got here at the TLM.
So this past week has been pretty adventurous, and I am not sure if I told you that my P-day this week was going to be today because of mini Zone Conference tomorrow. I don't really look forward to having a Zone Conference. We already have a lot of stuff that is not normal schedule yet it is so it is normal, (I don't really know if that made any sense) but yeah I just don't look forward to it for some reason, not sure why but I am sure it will be a fun time anyways.
So I guess I'll start from Christmas to today.
After the phone call Saturday:
So after the phone call Elder Yorgason, Elder Thode, and I just hung out at the Jones. We were going to go to the Martinez's house in Midland 1st Ward but because the 2nd Ward missionaries were a little late we decided to stay at the Jones because Curtis, a ward missionary in our ward wanted to visit us so he was on his way. He went to Brasil on his mission, I'm pretty sure I told you about him. He goes out with us on Splits every week and because Elder Yorgason and I do Portuguese studies he comes for that once a week too and helps us with Portuguese and answers questions we have about Brasil. He gave us Gatorade and M&M's for Christmas when he stopped by and we talked with him and the Jones that night.
We went back to our apartment with Brother Jones and you know how missionaries have to back up when driving? Well he passed the driveway to our apartment and we asked if he wanted us to back him up. He simply replied: "No you don't need to do that, you just back up and if you don't hear crashing glass you're okay!" (His voice cracks a lot because he flew fighter jets in the military so it added to the humor of the joke)
Sunday December 26, 2010
We had Church this day and Elder Thode woke up and said "Elder Larsen, you know what I just remembered when I woke up last night at like 12:00? You have to give a talk today in Sacrament meeting." Little to say, I didn't have any trouble waking up that morning. At church a member sang Oh Holy Night and they had piano and violin accompaniment. It was pretty awesome. I would love to learn how to play violin. I have had quite a few opportunities at the Jones house to play piano as well so that has been nice. After Church we went back to our apartment and ate Lunch. (Yes mom I am eating :) ) and then we came back because an 8 year old daughter of some members had us teach her the lessons before she got baptized so we went to her baptism. Her cousins were there and they were from the Albuquerque area so I told one of their sons that if the know any wilsons with Andrew and the rest of their family that I said "Hi". They also like Doctor Who, one of them was wearing a bright red bowtie.
Sunday we just did a lot of work and tracting and stuff, it was a longer day than others. We did eat at the Johnson's house, they are a really nice family that has a lot of involvement with the missionaries. Brother Johnson is really cool, and we ate left overs from Christmas dinner and it was delicious. We also got to teach a recent convert Stacey Hughes who we committed to coming to Church next Sunday. We really went by the spirit and explained what he needed to do to have happiness in life because recently he has been having some troubles and people always seem to drop church first so they can "Sort out their problems" He will be coming to church next week, I'm pretty sure of it.
Monday December 27, 2010
Today was a very good day, we were able to meet a lot of people and we met this family of 5 that asked us to come back, named the Hoppers. It looked like it was going to rain today as well but it cleared up and was very hot and sunny which was nice. For some reason can't really remember much that happened today. Actually while writing that I just remembered stuff. We met a crazy guy who was sawing off branches on a tree. Elder Thode walked up and asked if he could help and the guy charged at him and started screaming and it was really weird. We're pretty sure he was drunk, he asked if Elder Thode was serious and Elder Thode said yes. The guy was just really weird. We got out of that situation as fast as we could and then 2nd Ward picked us up and we went to Taco Bell. Before we went in, we ran into Jesus, the man who we baptized in my last area and tried to talk to him. (He still has to work on his English skills, but I could communicate in my Portuguese/Spanish) He's a really cool and humble guy. He was riding his bike when we met him. I got the volcano box and it was really hot so we got to the point where Elder Eppich and Elder Mulcock (2nd Ward missionaries) wanted me to eat this hot sauce that we got from Taco Bell so we did that and it was really hot and spicy. I'm not too good with handling food like that. (Also, Curtis came over for portuguese studies that morning)
Tuesday December 28, 2010
Today was an awesome day! We got to do studies and then we went and taught the Hopper Family. It was just really cool, everything that we hoped for to happen during that lesson happened. We got to their house and they were literally at the door, the kids were and they said "Come on in, we've been waiting for you" We went in and taught them the restoration and the mom wanted us to talk about why we were serving on a mission. We told them why, gave them books of mormon and then we got a return appointment for next Monday as well. One of them was also taking notes of what we were talking about which was pretty cool. We went and visited Bobby, an inactive member in the ward and he was working on his cars. He has 4 mustangs. So many people have mustangs, corvettes, camaros, here in Midland. We didn't get to have a lesson with him but we did get to talk with him for a bit. After that we biked to Curtis's house and went to visit with James. James smoked on Sunday so he isn't able to get baptized on the 1st like we planned but that got him a little bit angry at himself and he said he's going to stop for real and we made a plan for him to stop smoking and ways to stop the cravings as well or to deal with them. He is such a cool guy. He's very honest with us and just likes visiting with us as well. After that we didn't have any set appointments and we ended up asking Curtis if we could see his pictures from Brasil and talk about Brasil. It pumped us up as well so we're excited for that. We met a lot more people today as well. We have a lot of return appointments with people we met and it just felt good because we were working hard when we went to bed. Also continuing on the hot food eating thing that 2nd ward is on, we had Habenuero peppers last night and I only ate half of one, and not even the seeds. It was so hot, we did the dumb and dumber thing with Ketchup and that helped a little. I had to soak my tongue in cold milk because it burned so much.. -_- Not a smart idea. This morning I woke up and felt a little sick this morning but I'm feeling okay now.
Well that brings it up to today. That was pretty in depth, woah! So yeah... For Christmas I got a corvette... A hotwheels one! :P
We moved back into our apartment and its been a pretty fun time. The set up is nice. We are going to the Mall today with 2nd Ward, we don't really want to play football today and that pepper I ate last night isn't too good -_- Never doing that again, but I can say that I tried it. Haha.
Sounds like you've been getting a lot of stormy weather lately, I read your email Dad and that sounds cool. (Literally!) :P We have been having a little cold weather but it has been getting back to the 60's again which is nice, especially for biking. It got cold enough that I needed to buy gloves, but I got some at Ross's for $5 and they look like the brown ones I have at home. Those have helped a lot.
I hope you have an awesome New Year, we already had our party with the Wilsons. I'm glad we got to do that before they moved. Still haven't had much contact with them? See if you can get Andrew to write to me, or email me. Haven't heard from him for a while.
We have the evening off for new years so we'll probably spend it with the 2nd ward elders. We're pretty tight with them, even though they aren't in our district.
I really enjoyed the Phone call on Christmas, it was a bit surreal and a reminder that I am actually serving on my mission. Time can certainly sneak up on you quick. One more Christmas on the mission already! I did get a little sad after the phone call, even though you said not to. Just the whole Christmas season being over is a bit sad because it was nice to look forward to. Also I found out that I am never trunky. You can only be trunky when you've hit your year mark. Before that you're just homesick. Now I can be politically correct on that :P
Love you guys a lot, and miss you! Hope you're doing alright with all that snow! Hope to hear from you soon, and have a happy new year!
Love,
-Elder Phillip Larsen
Quote of the Week - "We leave our families for 2 years so people we meet can be with theirs for eternity" Just something that Elder Yorgason told the Hopper family when we taught them, I thought it was pretty cool. I forgot to bring the Quote book that I have from the MTC and field. I'll remember for next week. Still don't know if this is going to be a thing yet.
Pictures!
001 - is of a 'Bow-legged' milk jug that we had in our fridge. Only in Texas!
003 - Is our current apartment. It is behind a members house.
004 is an oil pump that someone called a nodding donkey, I figured I'd send a picture of that since they are so common here. Everyone works in oil pretty much.
006 - Only in Texas will you see a sign with a Cow getting its butt chopped off smiling. :P
007 - A full sized mobile home. It took up the entire side of the street and had a police escort in front of it.
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