OPA! Date: December 15, 2014 at 6:05

Yo yo! Family!

Hey! Everyone sounds so awesome! Glad to hear from all of ya! Honestly P-days are only great because of Email!

Alright so we had a pretty good week I guess. Since I last wrote on Wednesday we had a pretty normal 5 days. Walked around and Invited everyone we saw to church and then did you usual. ha We are currently strugglin to get some solid investigators. Our area is pretty rich so the people are harder to get a hold of and not as humbled and ready to hear the gospel. So yeah is a struggle. We are teaching a few sweet people but they are moving super slow. We have a church pastor who is super cool because he basically just studied the Bible for 10 years on his own and then created his own Church because he couldnt stand the corruption he kept seeing in all the other ones around him. He has tons of questions and we dont know how much listening he actually does when we teach but he is reading the Book of Mormon so hopefully the spirit will crack through then. He is super educated which means that I cant understand a word he says so I sit there and play with his dog the entire time. HA jk I pay attention.. as much as I can. We also taught our American people and as expected they kinda turned us down because the Mother is a very strong Catholic. Which is a bummer because the daughter would be elict otherwise. We still sat there and talked with them. They kept bringing up questions about the church though and temples and stuff so we were pretty much teaching them gospel truths anyways without them knowing it. haha Love it when that happens. 

Other then all this, life in Brasil is pretty sick. Still dont have the language where I want it to be but that is alright. Elder Loveland is great but he is having a hard time run the area and help me learn the language so I get kinda left in the dirt a lot. Its all good though. Part of the learning process. This place is so funny though. There is just such a weird culture to it. So one side of our area is super loaded with cash and the other is kinda fevela status so we see some of the weirdest things sometimes. Like horse drawn carridges in the middle of the appartment highrises. And yeah everyone here are beach dwellers so Shirts and irrelevant. I love it here though even if the work is hard. When you compare it to the states is probably more succesful number wise but the work is just so much more than numbers so it struggles. Hopefully we can get someone to come to church. Then we can talk about baptism. haha 

So yeah SKYPE next week on the 25th.. we will be at a members home. Not sure yet but it will be pretty sweet to see some faces! Stay posted.

Well, family you all sound awesome. Glad to hear AZ was so sweet! B! Youre a man and a half! That 6 months to sexy worked out for ya! If you remember and Elder Stanger that was Visa waiting in your mission I met him at the CTM and he said he knew you. Also I met the kid that just left from your home ward in the CTM as well. There was some serious AZ represented in the CTM. Mom&Dad travel safe. Dad- glad to see you still wear the gross old sweaters! Mom you look great! Love you both. LAMBSONS! Rollin up in the BENZ! jk Suburban is pretty sick though! Hope the travel was safe. You guys are awesome. W&S&B hope you guys are alright. What are we gonna do about skyping all the non new mexico people? Kodras! Enjoy the vactions! Glad to hear the AZ game was sick. Beardown. Hang in there guys! Enjoy christmas with the RENTS. 

ALRIGHT 

Love all of ya. Love the gospel. Read your scriptures. They are a lifesaving device!

love,

ELDER CHRISTENSEN

3rd Week on the Beach!‏ Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2014

Family! How are ya?

First off this week was transfer week and so for whatever reason we dont have a P day until wednesday so for now on every 6 weeks just expect and email later in the week. No changes were made for me or anyone in our house really so its all good in the hood.

Another week is in the books and cant honestly look back and say it was any better than the week before! ha But its all good. Had some cool experiences along the way that were pretty great. We knock doors pretty much all day long and on this one door in particular we knocked an started to talk. She was asking us some questions about where we were from and then we found out that they both speak english! haha so it through them off pretty hard and we started laughing about it. They let us in and yeah we have some new investigators in English and I actually get to talk to them! So i get to feel like a missionary again! Its pretty great. We saw them this monday and I dont know how far it will last but hey I enjoy it for now. Just another week of walking and trying to learn Portuguese other wise. I feel like I understand most of what people are trying to say but if it enters another topic other than the gospel I am doomed. I am beginning to understand a lot more about myself and grow stronger so thats the positive side. Still not loving it too much but hey its all part of the journey. Oh and another funny story I just remembered was that last night we had to push a members car out of the road! There was an underground water pipe that just exploaded and he was driving over the water (because it just flodded the entire streeet) and his front end fell in to this massive ditch that the broken pipe caused! haha so we got to help out with that yesterday night! ha 

Christmas is coming and yeah we will get to skype. We will work out the details on that as we get closer to it. Thanks for all the stuff in the package. Not going to lie I opened everything, but I feel like I was supposed to because I wouldnt have been able to wear my christmas socks everyday otherwise! Thanks mom your great! Other things to answer your questions. There are 3 americans in total at our place. E. Brown arrived 6 weeks before I did and was serving in Boise for 10 months before as well. There are 2 native Brasilians and one other Argentinian . So yeah we all just got transfer calls last night and nobody is changing so we will all be here for christmas. For P-day we will probably just go get some food real quick. Go back to the place. Sleep and maybe play some Phase 10. we arnt aloud to leave our area or play soccer but in all honesty is too hot outside anyways to enjoy it. So yeah P-days are not the greatest but hey you learn to enjoy them anyways. 

you guys sounds like your doing great. Mom sorry to hear christmas isnt up yet. You will get there. Jenn- so sick about the phone! lets see how long it lasts! also good luck with the car hunt. West- Brooklyn you are adorable. Keep on being texan! you guys will enjoy the DISCO! ha yeah man beach probably outdoes that grimmy rio . Nano- glad to hear you guys still do rediclous things like christmas at Disneyland! But hey I guess its kinda close by so make the most of it. Enjoy the cooler air in NM. I miss it too! haha 

Sorry the letters have been getting more and more lame but I have to write my ritzville people to see what has been going down! I love you all! I Will do better next week! No need to worry bout me! LOVE

if I have time I will try to send pics after

Segunda semana Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2014 12:01

What it do!

Man what a week. Longest week of my mission! Started off on tuesday and (also the shift key doesnt work well so i am not going to even try) i recieved your christmas package! thanks mom your the best. we tried to get some police stuff done here because the place where i would normaly have done it in sao paulo was closed so anyways we tried to do it here and because the goverment is corrupt and has a whole bucket of problems it fell through and now we are just going to try sometime this week. the rest of the week we did pretty much the same thing every day. walked, talked, slept, pretty much the same thing everyday. its weird working here because there is no break for dinner. you work for 9 hours strait and you dont start work until 2... waiting for the sun to pass by. so pretty much it feels super long.. every day. but its alright. one day , i think it was thursday, we contacted this one american in the street. haha he was from Main or something and he was just wondering the streets looking for an address! haha he was a pretty goofy guy and it was fun to be able to lead the conversation over elder loveland haha and feel like a missionary again. 

in all honesty, it has been a pretty stressfull experience trying to stay possitive through all this. language is just the half of it I think. everything about this mission is different. the way they think about the work, the way the work is organized and everything. it is kinda a bumer to walk into and see just how skewed everything here is. but no need to worry. I know things will improve and that with time and effort all things will get better. 

but to answer some more of your questions- No, president doesnt speak english. Not close to missionaries. not really sure why but yeah its a weird topic. Lunch we have provided by members. sometimes we eat with them and other times we have it brought to our appartment. My ward is pretty normal sized but our area is huge so for the amont of area our ward covers I would say there is that many active members. The ones that are though are pretty great. no bug problem either. Our chapel just got shut down actually because its pretty ghetto so now we get to meet in a newer building that is a little farther away. i drink the water and everything else. I feel like this area at least has close to no problems with any of that. So its never crossed my mind that much. no problems with food or anything as well. I honestly feel a whole lot healther than i did in the states! haha

You all sound so great. glad to hear that thanksgiving was so good for everyone! Love you all so much. Now is the time to be bumpin some christmas! Ha everyone here in brazil is rockin the lighs and are starting to get pumped for it. Its funny how man american christmas songs you hear walking down the street that are just super irronic to be playing in brazil! 

alright well my time is up..

love ya 

will do better next week. this keyboard sucks!

ELDER CHRISTENSEN

My body is here! But my mind is in america! Sent: Mon 11/24/14 7:37 AM

Im here! Joao Pessoa exists guys! Its not just some mythical town that you
only hear about in fairy tales! HAHA I love it here! Seriously one of the
most beautiful places on earth. Our area is beach side so we walk next to
the beach every other day... Super pretty! Culture is super different and
the temperature is way too hot but its so cool to be walking around these
beach side favelas and talk to all of these incredibly warm people!
Seriously I love these Brazilians already and I dont even know what they
are saying to me! haha Language is one of the most important tools that God
has given us. Of that I have no doubt. Its just one of those things that
goes unappriciated until you realize that you dont know how to speak or
understand a single thing for a full day! haha So yeah I feel like I have
finally arrived but my Language is nowhere where I want it to be. But tudo
bem. It will come with time. Thats what I keep telling myself. All I need
is a few months and I will be set. Heavenly Father knew how to humble me
pretty quick! haha But yeah I dont know what to say! We live in a pretty
ghetto appartment with holes in the wall that you use to flush the toilet.
We live with 2 other compainionships so in all there Is 6 of us living in
the same amount of space that we had in the states. We eat some
redonkulusly good grub! I love the food here in Brasil! everything is
good.. with some Guarana to top it off.. umm all day! The lunch here is the
main course so we spend 2 hours for lunch and then walk around for the rest
of the day hoping that some one might feed us some snacks at around 8. haha
My trainer here is Elder Loveland! from Georgia. He is pretty much a stud.
Love his guts. Been out for 15 months and has a lot of great advice. Never
served stateside but its no diferent now. Once your here your here and
thats all that matters.  We speak in english quite a bit but thats just
this week. Next week we are going to be cracking down and getting to work
on how I can serve these people better in Portuguese! Now that I got my
feet wet in the area I am ready to give Brasil all I got. I just need to
gain the ability first haha! We had a baptizm this Sunday so the steriotype
of Brasil is already holding pretty firm! haha She was incredibly prepared
so It was fun to be there and watch it all go down!

I dont know what else you want me to share. But if you have questions ask
me cause there is too much I could write about this place but It would take
me all day!

You guys are incredible! Thanks for all the emails! Mon&Dad!- Travel safe!
I hope you have a great holiday! I loved hearing about the Christmas tree
and all the things you guys got going for you. Hope Grandpa is alright! And
B! That poor kid. Its always hard to go home but 10 days early!! Dang..
Tell him I love him.  

Alright its time for me to chow down and get to my first P-Day in JP!
Much love - PEACE
Tchao,
ELDER CHRISTENSEN

Where am I‏ Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 14:33

What is up my family! So right off the bat this computer is super ghetto so I have to wait for 1 minute every time I spell a word. It sucks... haha but todo bem! OHHHH my goodness I am in BRASIL! Sao Paulo is super sick! I pretty much love it here but I honestly dont want to be in the CTM anymore. My teachers are super great and I love every one of them. But once you have been in the field and know how great it is you cant go back. So yep these next few days will be a grind and a half. We do ge tot go out and do some street contacting which is way tight! My favorite thing ever. Our first person that we contacted was pretty much gold! Every time we get to go out we give out 8 BofMs between the 4 of us! Our district is only those of us who were visa waiting which is only us 4. Everyone else that you saw in the picture was either a band new missionary or a brazilaro! But yeah there was a good number of us. Today we went to the temple! Sao Paulo one. We watched it in English which was kinda a bummer but I went through the vail in Port. I just read it off a page. Still dope. My comp is from Portland so I am still rocking the NO Comp from Utah record... Its fun to be able to swap mission stories with everyone on the mission. I cant imagine all the stories I will have once I am done with brasil! Language is coming along. I feel better at it everyday but seriously I still just want to go to the field.  FAMILY I LOVE YOU- West&Stasia&BROOKLYN! THATS INCREDIBLE I am so excited for you guys! Oh my gosh I honestly didnt think she was going to come soo soon but oh my gosh she is perfict! ALRIGHT i love you This computer is the worst. I hate having to leave you guys with such a lame email but I really need to gobefore I puch a hole in this compture screen! I love you all ! I love brasil! I love the food! TOdos! ELDER CHRISTENSEN

Made it Wed, 5 Nov 2014 12:12

Hey hey family!

Just made it into the Sao Paulo CTM! Loving it! I can see buildings for days and it crazy to see another part of the world! The room I am in is in the top so I can see pretty much everything from our window. Next time I will send you a gnarly pic so you can see. My companion is Elder Beavers and he was VISA waiting in Ogden UT for 14 months before he got his. The other elders that are in our room are ones that have been out forever as well. One that was out for 15 and the other was actually in the MTC in Provo at the exact same time. People here are already dope! I can just see all of um and I want to badly to just walk up and be able to dish it out in Portugesse but unfortunatly I cannot. I hope to be able to pick it up again though. The week will be moving pretty fast I think and they have a different program for all the 2 week people that is faster and more intensive though so haha it will kick me in the face thats for sure!

 

Plan ride was long... super long. They had tablets in the back of all the seats in front of you though so it was better to waste time playing solitare if nothing else. I dont really know too much else of what to say. I loved talking to you guys yesterday! Its always a good feeling to be able to call home and everyone sounds pretty much the same and no awkward feeling about it. JENNY! I am so sorry I ran out of time and never got to call you guys.. Thats what happenes when you barrow from members and they have to make their own flights to South Africa!

 

You guys are all so awesome! Keep it up and know that I am praying for you guys everyday! 

 

ALRIGHT everyone . Buckle up!, This is gonna be a fun one.

 

Amo voces muito! Tchao Tchao!

ELDER CHRISTENSEN

LAST TIME IN AMERICA!‏ Sent: Mon 11/03/14 1:00 PM

Yo Yo Family!

What a weekend! 

Ok well first off we had 2 baptisms this weekend! Anthony Elder got baptised and Jacob Carruth (less active autistic kid that decided randomly to get baptized last week) as well! It was so great to finish my stateside mission like that! But let me tell ya, It was super stressful! haha! Our week was full of ups and downs! Great lessons and let downs of not being able to get all of my people to church and not even getting to teach one of my favorite investigators!! But hey its all good. I keep getting this overwhelming feeling that all is well and that the Lord will protect my area! Transfers also came last night. Elder Lauti will be staying in the area and his new companion has been out for a long time and apparently is pretty FLY so I am pleased to be able to leave the place in good hands. This last sunday so super hard! It was testimony meeting and of course we as missionaries pretty much always go up and bear testimony but this time we were invited to go first. It was pretty much at that time that I realized I was leaving! A wave of emotion just hit me in the face! I am so bummed to  leave such an awesome ward! Elders Family was sitting front row and I just hope that they know how much they changed my life! Plus everyone in the ward kept getting up and bearing their testimony about missionary work and kept saying goodbye and stuff like that.. I'm like "freak, people how am I supposed to leave this place if you keep making me love you so much!" Dang.. Missions are hard to leave! But its all good. We are definitely going back to small little Ritzville, WA  after my mission! You need to meet these incredible people! btw Anthony's baptism was so sick! David was the one who baptized him and it was one of the best things that I have ever had the privilege to see! It was rocky at first but so good! Anthony forgot to bend his knees so he almost knocked himself out when he leaned back under the water! haha but yep yesterday was pretty crazy, running around and saying goodbye to everyone! Also this week, Halloween was pretty fun! We celebrated on Wed as a branch and did carnival games and the whole shebang!  Pretty fun giving the kids a hard time while running the "Fishing for prizes" game! haha We ran out of stuff to give out pretty quick (even though most of it was pencils and bookmarks!!?) and so we ended up giving this poor girl a rubber band! haha She wasn't having it! haha Not even a little laugh.. just stormed off in her princess costume haha! I love the kids here! Halloween was pretty fun.

Yeah sorry everything is super scattered and randomly exploding out of my head. Hope you can read this letter and have it make sense when I get done with it! Anyways!- got my packing done this morning! Not a moment too late! I think I have most everything?! haha I ended up deciding that none of my sweaters are that important to send home. So I am giving away pretty much everything I don't need. Hope that's alright. Don't know how much weight is allowed in each bag but I will figure that out while I'm staying with Elder and Sister Fisher from the mission home tonight. I still need to buy a card to call home with. So I will take care of that. And then yeah idk what ever happens happens.. It still hasn't really hit me that I will be in a different country in 2 days?! Hopefully I am prepared enough and if not I know Heavenly Father will take care of it.

Man missions teach you a lot that's for sure. The Holy Ghost is a very real presence! There are so many things that I see myself doing everyday or situations that I am reacting to that I could never have seen me do just 1 year ago. I am so great full for the growth I have already seen in myself and the people around me! How lucky am I to know that I still have 14 months of this!! What What?! That's awesome!

Stay posted everyone! I will be calling ya on the morrow so make sure you answer your unknow numbers!! K love ya!

BYeeee

ELDER CHRISTENSEN

Outside a members house..

 AND then this crater that we found just outside of Odessa. We finally decided to stop and take some pics