First Area... Frequesia Do O.

oh wow i have so much to tell you guys and not enough time but i will try my best! so i arrived on monday and it was a long day. the flights were long and i was just super tired. but we went to the mission office and it was so cool. it is beautiful and you can see the city in the distance. the city is absolutely insane. i think it has around the same amount of people as new york city but honestly way more buildings here. it just goes on forever. im not directly in sao paulo but im close enough to see it a lot. the language has been super tough this week, it has been my biggest struggle. but obviously i know it will come with time. im learning a lot every day. my companion is elder lima da silva. he is from brazil and knows almost no english haha so that has been a challenge. he is actually an awesome guy though and a super good missionary and we are definitely friends. we have been house hopping a little bit because the house in our area has no electricity right now. so as of now we are living with some elders in an area close by sleeping on mattress pads in their living room. its good for now but im hoping we get electricity back in our house so we dont have to walk so much to our area every day. we are in an area called frequesia do ó and also work in brasilandia if yall want to look it up. 

ok quick things to know about brazil that i just thought were funny or different than the US:

you dont flush the toilet paper here. they dont have the right plumbing i believe so you throw your toilet paper away in a trash can once you are done lol

the acai here is to die for. sooooo good. also their pizza has chocolate in the crust which at first i didnt think would work out but i actually liked it. the food here has been good so far! beans and rice and lots of meat!

at some public water fountains they just have a cup there so you can fill it and drink out of it and then put it back for other people to use. so carrying a water bottle around is definitely a good thing.

honestly they really dont eat dinner or breakfast here, just snacks. so you have a biggg lunch. im learning to stuff myself because i know i wont eat much for the rest of the day. that is taking some getting used to so ive got some snacks at home luckily. 

the people here are very poor compared to the us but they are so happy and so humble. many of them are willing to listen to our message and take care of us super well. they love americans and always try to come up and talk to me in english and they all know i love basketball as well. they love their soccer thats for sure. games are on sundays and you can hear gunshots and fireworks going off all day haha. we had 9 investigators at church this week which was awesome and made me super happy! we have several references to start in my new area so there is lots of work to do!

ok quick story. so my companion tries so hard with english but he knows he only knows a few words. but he'll put a few words together like "i...like...that" and then he'll freak out and go "ahhhh I fluente" we definitely laugh at each other as we both try to learn a new language so that has been fun.  

pics- first arriving at the airport with the secretaries of the mish, GG, favela views, me and my comp!!, and more city views (if you zoom in you can see how the buildings go on forever)