It's a funny thing, because Elder Santana's parents
are Pernambucanos (they are from Pernambuco)....they married and moved
to São Paulo where he was born....he visited Pernambuco once before
about 7 years ago and he got real sick to his stomach (maybe food
poisoning or something). Since he's started his mission here, he's been
sick to his stomach....In Brazil, people don't feel even the slightest
uncomfortable in telling you that they have diarrhea (sp?)....it's
really weird....if you ask someone who looks like they are sick how they
are doing, they'll respond, "oh I'm fine, I just have diarrhea
today"....and then people react and respond like it were any other small
conversational thing....so yeah, everyone found out that Elder Santana
has had diarrhea for about 10 days now....it was a bit difficult to work
on the street when we had to stop and run to the chapel or back to our
house every hour or so for him to use the bathroom. It's not his fault
though.
Tuesday
at about 1:30 AM, he woke up and was having a lot of stomach
pain....the other Elders got really worried and insisted that we go to
the hospital. We called our branch president here in Vitória whose name
is Elias. This guy is a stud. He showed up within 10 minutes in his
little 1990's Volkswagen golf to give us a ride....the hospital (more
like a clinic really) in Vitória didn't have the right equipment to do
his exams, so we had to go to Recife, which is about a 30 minute car
ride. Let me tell you something about Brazilian state highways....they
aren't lighted. Let me tell you another thing about 1990's Volkswagen
Golf's....their windshield wipers suck....to through some more gas on
the fire, it started to rain....I was absolutely bewildered as to how
our Branch President was able to the road through the rain and
darkness....to make it just comical, the wipers blew a circuit and
stopped working all together....so there we were, flying (Brazilians
have lead feet!) on the dark Brazilian highway, in the rain, with no
working windshield wipers, with my companion cradled up wincing in pain,
and our branch president trying to simultaneously drive and stick his
hand out the window to dry off the windshield with a dirty rag he
happened to have in the back seat....yup. Let's just say that I gained a
stronger testimony of prayer after this whole ordeal. The Lord
protected us until we got to the hospital in Recife. Fun experience
though getting there!
The
exams came out normal...it looks like Elder Santana caught some kind of
parasite. The doctors gave him an antibiotic that solved the problem
really quick. In all, we ended up spending 2 complete days watching the
wall paint peel in our apartment. It's good to get out folks.
We
had to work 2x as hard to try and make up for the time that we lost. We
didn't have the same success that we'd been having in bringing
investigators to church. That little boy Alex that was baptized was as
happy as could when he was confirmed yesterday. You could see his
happiness on his face. He ran to pick up all the hymn books after
sacrament meeting was over, without even being asked. I can only imagine
the happiness that I would feel if a little guy like this makes it to
serve a mission...only time will tell.
I
made a few visits to the other areas in our district. I've been serving
(and will finish my mission) serving as district leader....it's been
fun for me so far. I'm able to apply a lot of the things that I've
learned throughout my mission with these newer missionaries. They are
all really eager to learn, and I'm really eager to pass what I know to
them, so it's a great combo.
There
were a few people that I interviewed for baptism this week...that's
always one of the highlights for me. I love seeing the desire people
have to enter into the church....more often than not, the people have
doubts or get cold feet right before their baptism. We really have to be
in tune with the Spirit to be able to help these people to make the
right decision. Sometimes it's a simple worry or concern that they have,
like "what will my friends think?" or "will I be able to play soccer on
Sundays?". Sometimes, it's a lot more complicated, like "I had an
abortion 15 years ago and I just found out that my husband moved out on
me to live with another woman and I don't have any money to buy food for
my 5 children ...can you help me Elder?" That was the case on Saturday.
After a good long talk, a very spiritually guided lesson, we helped
this good faithful woman see how she could find peace and real stability
in our Father in Heaven's Earthly Kingdom. The teachings and blessings
of the Gospel are really the only thing that could help a woman like
that. She courageously accepted, even in the middle of many doubts and
real concerns, to be baptized. What a privilege it was to talk with this
lady of such great faith.
Even
when it looks like things are going wrong, the Lord is always willing
to drop us one of his tender mercies. I'm very grateful for this, and
all of the wonderful experiences that I've had as a missionary up until
now. Let's see if I can't have a few more before my times up!
Until next time,
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