Aveiro 5-9-2016

Aloha mai kakou e ka ohana!!!

BAPTISMO (baptism)!!!!! It’s official, our investigator, Ana, was baptized on the 7th of May by Elder Meza, and confirmed a member of A Igreja de Jesus Cristo dos Santos does Últimos Dias and received the Holy Ghost by me, on the 8th of May!!!! I’m SOOO happy and proud of her!!! It’s been a crazy week, but it’s all been worth it!!!

Elder Meza, Ana and I before going down to the water.

On Friday we did splits. Me and Elder Teixeira took the ZLs (Zone Leaders) to Ana’s house to do her baptism interview. She passed!!! Elder Gabbitas and Elder Meza went to a different part of town to do the interviews for Estrella and Rachel. (The also got baptized on May 7.) They ended up getting stuck there til 8pm because of the bus schedule and stuff. Anyway, they call me, and tell me that Elder Teixeira and I need to go to Ílhavo to go invite some of Ana’s friends to the baptism. I’m like “wat!!!!” cuz I’ve never been there, and Elder Teixeira and I are “greenies”. The ZLs decide to stay with us, and we start hunting for a way to get to Ílhavo. We finally find a bus stop that goes to Ílhavo, but by then it’s late. Elder Teixeira and I, two greenies, end up leaving the ZLs, and going on to Ílhavo while the ZLs go back to Coimbra, since it was getting late already (I actually told the ZLs they should go home, since we would get back late). During the bus ride over (about 4-5 miles away) I’m kinda freaking out cuz I don’t know where we’re going, my companion doesn’t speak English, and my Portuguese isn’t amazing. However, we get there safely. We get off the bus and OUR PHONE DIES!!!! UGH!! The phone that has all the addresses!!! Shoot! We almost give up but decide to see if we can go charge it or something. We try two phone stores, a Chinese store, then go back to the same two phone stores, and then we’re finally able to make a call to the ZLs, and they give us the addresses. We contact the first guy we see and he tells us where all the streets are, then takes us to the first house!!!! Amazing!!! We get to the first house and drop off the invitation. We find what we think is the second house, drop off the invitation, then head back to the bus stop cuz our time had run out. We couldn’t get the third and last one out...shucks! We got back to Aveiro safely and just got to work passing by people and doing contacts. Just us two greenies!!! When we got home, Elder Gabbitas and Elder Meza guys were freaking out, haha! 

I learned a lot from that. I learned that I can do it! My Portuguese isn’t perfect, but that whole time I was leading us, talking to people and trying to get work done, I didn’t need English. I’m soooo grateful for the Lord helping me to see that I’m capable.

Saturday was the baptism!!! IT WAS POURING!!! But the show must go on right? hahaha. The service was nice and short, and Ana brought 4 friends!!! Elder Meza ended up baptizing her twice, hehe, but it happened! The beach was storming and stuff, (Satan doing his best to stop it) but she was still baptized!!!

"The show must go on..." Ana being ready to be baptized. Elder Kim front and center.

She's got the thumbs up. She's good to go!

Also, I’m soooo happy I got to talk to you guys on Skype! I’m sorry you guys couldn’t see me that well, but I could see you guys perfectly! It was awesome! Mom, I wanna say Happy Mother’s Day!!! Portugal’s one was last week, but America’s one was yesterday, sorry I forgot. I love you though, mom, and Ima try send something soon.

I love you guys all sooooo much!!! Please keep up the good work and take care of yourselves!!! Amo-os (I love you guys)

Até próximo,

Elder Kim

Back to front: House mates Elder Gabbitas, Elder Meza, Elder Texeira, and Elder Kim heading out to the baptism.
These Elders are cool! Three people were baptized on May 7, 2016 by this group.

It took five weeks, but he finally got our package. Yay :)

These are words from a member (whose family (the Pereira ʻohana) takes real good care of the missionaries and also allowed them to use their computer to Skype us) about Elder Kim:

 We don't do much but we're always grateful to do what we can =)

Lately we've been teaching with your son (Elder Kim) and Elder Meza, they're doing a great work and Elder Kim's Portuguese is way too good for someone who's here for only two transfers.  He's also really funny. These four elders are the worse, always pranking and stuff but they're awesome, hard-working and most of all good friends. We'll miss them when they get transferred...

With my best regards,

Karina Santos

The Pereira ʻOhana left to right: Karina Santos, Kelly, Nelly, Carlos and Elder Kim