Journal Style
Tuesday - today is transfers! This morning we finished up packing and cleaning the apartment and lugged all of our bags to the bus station. We were worried they wouldn't let us put all our bags on because technically there is a weight limit, but we had no problems! We got to Oriente and then started the frenzy! Transfers are always crazy. All these missionaries saying hi to everyone, old companions, friends, new companions. Getting packages and letters. It was really sad saying goodbye to sister Crowder. I wish I could have stayed with her longer. But my new comp is super cute and sweet, so I am excited to work with her too. The trip up to Porto went very smoothly as well. We just sat on a train for 3 and a half hours, then took a metro and a bus, and soon we were at our apartment! (there was an elevator, thank the heavens!)
Wednesday--first day in Porto! We had district counsil in the morning, our district leader is from Moçambique, elder Zuca, his comp, elder souza is from Brazil and he plays piano incredibly well!! He is playing for the musical number on Saturday, so it's nice I get to practice with him. The other dupla is elder Blake who is from Spokane! And Élder Weber. They are the zone leaders. It is a fun group. After counsil, we went home for lunch, (I made zucchini pasta yumm!) and studies. Then we had a few appointments! I met a super sweet member named Miriam. She has a cool conversion story that includes this dream that she had. Her daughter is not a member and is deaf, she can read lips super well and can talk, but I am hoping to learn a little português sign language just to break the ice with her so maybe we can start teaching her about the gospel!
Thursday - OK. I forgot to do it on Thursday too, actually I forgot all week.... and I dont actually remember what we did.... But I will go over the things I do remember. On Thursday we taught two of our investigator, two cute old women. From what I've seen a great chunk of the population here is made up of old women. Lol. Then that night we had a fun "take care of yourself" night and we did facemasks, painted our nails, and put cucumber on our eyes! It was super fun.
Friday--once again forgot, so Ill just go through what I remember. We visited a member who lives pretty far away and we actually ended up getting pretty lost on our way, she has a car and when we called for help she didn't know anything because she usually just puts on the GPS in her car so doesn't know any of the road names! Reminds ya of someone you know lol (me). We eventually found it though and had a good visit with her. She had some great suggestions for us on how to improve the work, and what was cool that all of the things she said were things we had set goals to do at the very beginning of the transfer! I love like eating with members and in a matter of one week I have already subtly suggested to many sisters how much we would love to come share a meal with them at there home! We have marked a few meals already! Then that night we taught an English class! Actually I taught an English class because poor sister Allred has had nothing but native comps and so has taught English classes alone for six months and the elders in the neighboring area who come to our English class are from Moçambique and Brazil and don't speak English either. So I taught so Sister Allred could have a break. It went really well! It was super fun. We only had two students, if you don't count the elders who were both actively participating. I taught about regular conjugation in English (wayyyy easier than portuguese!) and one irregular form (for verbs like fry and cry that change to fries and cries in the he/she form) and then we still had a lot of time so I decided to teach the body parts! I drew a stick figure on the board and the lady said that he looked like Guilherme (the other student, he's 17 and reminds me of ronnie😢) so I wrote his name on the board too. Then we went through pronouncing each one until we had named most of the more common parts and then I started quizzing pronuncia pointing at the words and memory pointing to them on my own body. Then I started erasing the words. They freaked out at first, but they did great! They remembered most of them even if they struggled to pronounce mouth.... Then we learned head shoulders knees and toes and did it all together!
Saturday - - on Saturday we woke up at 5 in the morning and rushed to get ready in time to catch our train at 6:40am. The only train that would get us to lisbon on time was an alfa train because we had to be at the chapel at 10:30, and the normal train takes 3 1/2 hours to get there. The alfa got there in 2 1/2 and had comfy seats. It was worth the extra 10 bucks. We got there no problem and elder Moreira and I even had a little time to practice our musical number! I was so nervous.... It was bad. I was going to be singing in front of the entire mission AND an apostle with my very out of shape voice singing a song that sits in a very uncomfortable place in my range. I hadn't once sung it while practicing and felt good about how it sounded. I went up there and it went ok. I didn't feel great, but it hadn't been awful. I was mostly just glad it was over. Everyone said I did a good job though and that it was beautiful, I guess we are our own worst judges. The conference itself was so cool! Elder Andersen challenged us to DOUBLE the amount of non-members we have in church every week. Be bold and invite! He talked about new beginnings, for the church in Portugal and for us as missionárias, he said we shouldn't serve in the same was we did before. That we are starting a new mission now. I am still trying to think of how I can adjust the work to complement the existence of a temple in Portugal. It was cool though. Afterwards we ate lunch and headed out. Elder Sousa was nice and carried our box of book of Mormons for us to the train station. (it is soooo heavy!) The train back wasn't an alfa so it took a good 3 1/2 hours to get back to porto. Then we parted ways with the elders and it took us longer that normal to get home because, the bus was going to take way too long to show up so we decided to walk with this giant heavy box. We took turns eventually made it to our house. It's not that far of a walk, but we were both worn out. It was a cool day.
Sunday - - temple dedication! We went to the 9o'clock session of the dedication and it was so cool! I've never been to one before and it was a super neat experience. Elder Andersen even spoke in Portuguese the whole time! Isn't it just amazing how God qualifies his servents? This apostle who speaks French, gave a beautiful, eloquente speach and prayer in a strange language he didn't know. And he did great. After that we went to teach a lesson to one of our investigators, but we got there and she was clearly not feeling well. Then she started rolling herself a cigarette and talking about how she would never give up smoking. Not for anyone. The spirit was NOT in the room. I asked her to wait until we left to smoke and she was not happy, but she put down the cigarette and we started trying to teach about the plan of salvation, we hoped it would help give her a measure of hope. But she was shaking super bad at this point. I think her body at this point can't even handle not smoking. We had only taught a small portion until I started noticing that the spirit in the room was a little uncomfy and I felt we should leave. So I wrapped things up real fast and got out of there. I was worried that sister Allred didn't want to leave yet, but once we left she said she was feeling the exact same thing. It was an interesting experience, and a testimony builder of how when we doare doing the right things the spirit will protect us spiritually and physically! The rest of the day we just visited a few more members and the day was over!
Monday - - and here we are! Monday! We left this morning and went to lidl to do our shopping. We had almost no cleaning supplies in our house so we stocked up, we even found this GIANT thing of toilet paper on sale so we won't have to buy any more this transfer. When we got home, we got cleaning. After years and years of missionaries living in this house, we had quite a task in front of us. We spent all morning cleaning. I deep cleaned the bathroom including dismantling the sink to get the build up hair and grime out of the drain (I've gotten pretty good at it out here.) It was one of the worste Ive seen. In the end, I didn't have time to do the shower drain too, but I am sure it is even worse. Sister Allred got a good halfway through the kitchen because it was pretty gross. Well when I first got here, it seemed pretty clean, but the more we started emptying things out and deep cleaning the dirtier it seemed to get. We threw out several very old filthy and broken appliances. We didn't even get around to cleaning the other parts of the house. We wanted to go to the mall today, and if we wanted to have time to do anything, we needed to leave. So we tidied up a bit and head out! We missed our bus by two seconds, so we had to walk down to the metro. and that's where we are now! The metro should get here in a few minutes. Time to go shopping! Bye!
I thought I'd try this format and see how I feel. It ended up pretty long so I don't think I'll do it this way again. Good luck getting through all of it lol! Anyway. I know the church is true, I know christ lives. He is our savior and he loves us. I love you all! Have a great week!
Sister Hardy
Some of our cute members. Our cool shoes. Saying bye to sister Hoffman for the last time! Me and Guilherme!
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