Baptism that fell out of the sky; Tons of help from recent converts

 Whats up people?  How are all y'all??  How is school/work/everythingelse coming along??   Its pretty good down here in the south. Im really glad that its P-day today because I am super tired.  I don't know why, I haven't done anything exhausting recently, but I just feel dead.  It's already been 4 weeks into this transfer which is crazy surprising.  This transfer feels like it has gone a toooon faster than my first one, but then again I still have a couple of weeks left.  But I'm definitely enjoying it here.  Vera Cruz is just a really cool to serve.  The city is really peaceful and the members in our brand new branch always want to help out with the work and have it continue to grow.  Its also really nice because we legitimately have the best house in the mission that includes a sofa, big porch with washing machine and dryer for our clothes, nice kitchen, and a massive study room, not to mention the only house with a heater/air conditioner.  Haha I kinda wish that I didn't get this apartment first because I don't fully appreciate it yet and now I'm sure my next one will be a down grade :P.  

     But anyways, we had another good week of work.  The coolest thing was when we were walking down the street and then a lady started yelling to us from here house.  She was like `Hey are you the mormons?  yes? Come inside come inside!` It turns out that her 11 year old son named Douglas was baptized a couple of years ago.  They werent able to go to church very often while it was only in Santa Cruz but they heard that there was a branch here now and wanted to start going again.  The mom (named Luani or something spelled similar to that) wasn't baptized at the time as Douglas was because she was living with someone, but now they are separated and she told us that she wants to be baptized!  Haha it was soo cool!  If everything works out she will get baptized on the 10th along with Helena and hopefully Terezina.  Haha it seemed like a baptism that just fell out of the sky ;)  But we've been getting some new investigators with a ton of help from our recent converts.  Renan, a young man that was baptized last transfer, just called us up one day and said he wanted to go on visits with us to some of our investigators, and also he introduced us to some of his neighbors that he wants to teach.  Maicon, who is 17 and now preparing for his own mission has also been going with us to visit Terezina and is becoming friends with her and her daughter, and Jaci basically knows all of Vera Cruz and is giving us a lot of referrals.  There help is really helpful and encouraging and its making a big difference.

     We also had the awesome privilege of having Presidente Wright (Mission pres) joining for our district meeting.  It was really cool to see him and Sister Wright and talk a little bit.  He interviewed us all and gave little bits of advice to help us.  They are both really cool leaders and are really good at supporting and helping each and every missionary.  Well I think that about sums everything up.  Im doing fine and it sounds like you all are too.  Thanks for everything!!]

From the goodest guy

Elder Gee

Great week in Vera Cruz; Spoke in church! Terzina moved... right next to a new member family

Hello there,  How is everybody?  Its been a pretty good week here in Vera Cruz. Its already become really hot down here and now I´ll spend an extra hour in the sun each day because of daylight savings. Its been hot enough for me to be actually enjoying the rain today :).  Hows the weather in Utah?  Oh I just heard that there is already snow,  crazy!!  Maybe I wont mind this heat as much after all ;)  How is everything else in Utah? Is there anything super exciting going on that I should hear about?   

     We have a couple of investigators that are really progressing quickly and they should get baptized soon.  One of them is a woman named Helena.  She is really sweet and always happy.  She has been going to church consistently for the last month or so and she is going to all the activities as well. She really wants to get baptized, but just wants to take it slowly and not be rushed. One of the problems is that she is terrified of water :(  But she really has a testimony knows she wants to follow this path, so we have a baptismal date set with her in 2 weeks.  At the beginning of the week we went to visit another one of our really good investigators, Terezina and her daughter who both want to get baptized as well.  When we knocked at there house a different person answered and told us that they had moved away!  We were super surprised and didn't have her number to contact her.  We were both really scared that we had lost her and wouldn't be able to teach them anymore.  Luckily for us, they happened to move right next to a recent convert and saw us as we went to visit them.  The move actually turned out to be a great thing because they have already became friends these members, and also they live closer to the church. Terezina is still doing great and is progressing. Her testimony is continually growing and she has already read over half of the Book of Mormon, but she seems to want to take her time before getting baptized  too. They have had a hard time coming to church because her daughter Diana is really pregnant and the baby could come at any moment.  They think that it will be a lot easier after the birth and it will also be easier because they live closer to the church now.

    

  Yesterday was a good day at church and we had a lot of people show up  including an investigator named Rodrigo which was a complete surprise.  We had been teaching him for a couple of weeks but he didn't seem to interested and never ended up keeping the commitments that we gave him.  We decided that we probably wouldn't visit him any more with his lack of progress but he surprised us by being there and told us that he really wants to keep teaching him and that he would come back next week!  Haha the sacrament meeting was interesting because I ended up having to give a talk.  The branch president asked me to give it right before the meeting started which kinda surprised me.  I've never been that great of a public speaker in English let alone in a different language so I was kinda worried about how it would turn out. Luckily for me it was just a 5 min talk so it wasn't too bad and I just talked a little bit about the principles of the gospel.  It still was kinda rough, filled with awkward silences as I tried to think of what to say and how to say it but it was a good learning experience.  I'm just glad that our branch is super cool and loving  so I wasn't embarrassed while I was giving the talk.

     So anyways, life is good! Thanks for the emails you guys always send. They are always awesome to read!  I love you all and am always praying for you... so do the same for me!  I cant wait to hear from you next week!  

Love

Elder Gee

American companion, Elder Stevens;

Oí família! Whats up? How is autumn back in the states?  I'm doing well as usual and had a pretty fun week!  I'm already accustomed to working with Elder Stevens now and its been good to be able meet more investigators and recent converts better with the 2 areas combining.  Its been fun to have an American companion because its a lot easier to joke around and stuff, but I'm probably not learning Portuguese as fast now :P. 
   
  So the coolest thing was that I went on divisions with Elder Day again, but this time I got to go to Rio Pardo.  I was really excited because I remember Jamie talking a lot about it and how much she liked it.  I imagined that the city itself would be really similar to Vera Cruz because they are both little cities right next Santa Cruz, but when I arrived I was surprised to see how different it was.  Rio Pardo seemed a lot older than Vera Cruz, all the streets had buildings were more old fashioned.  The church there is still growing well there and we got to teach a lot of cool investigators that they have.  I only got to meet 1 family of members but they were really cool!  I met your mae Jamie, Fernanda and her family!!  Haha when I introduced myself to her she got soooo excited because she absolutely loved Sister Gee.  We sat in her house and we talked for a long time and she shared a ton of cool experiences that she had with Sister Gee.  She also showed us some pictures and letters that you sent that the greatly treasured.  Haha and do you remember Arthur Jamie?   I'm sure you do, he was one of the coolest kids ever and me and Elder Day joked around with him for a long time.  I'm still really bad at remembering Brazilian names, but I think that it was Rubia and also the dad  were there to  Wow it was such a cool experience to meet the whole family and have such and have such a strong connection to them.  But they are all doing great and really miss you.  They told me to make sure that you come visit them again someday :)  We stayed there for more than an hour just having a great time, and Fernanda didn't want "the brother of Sister Gee" to leave was trying to get us to stay for even longer when we had to run to our next appointment.  It was also kinda cool to be able to stay at the same apartment that you stayed at on the other side of the world.  It was pretty nice, and a lot better than the one in Santa Cruz that I visited. 
   
  But its been nice here in Vera Cruz as well.  The weather has been really nice without the rain and it hasn't been to hot. We didn't have to many people at church this last week and only had 1 investigator which was kind of disappointing.  It seemed like everyone was visiting family during the holiday "kids day" which is a really big deal here. Haha I felt ripped of since there isn't wasn't of these days in the United States, but then I remembered how dad used to always say that there is 1 Father´s day, one Mother´s Day, an then 363 kids' days :)  Oh and one day when we went to visit one of our good investigators that seems to be progressing a lot, we learned that she had moved!  Luckily she is still here in Vera Cruz and we know what street she lives on, but we don't know her address so we hope that we kind find her in the next couple of days. 

So like you said dad, it would probably be better to have the emails sent on Sunday from now on if that's possible because the hour difference will change and also we have been trying to come earlier than before.  But anyways I'm loving my mission, learning a lot, serving a lot, walking a lot, and also being blessed a lot.  This really is a great work and I'm glad that I have this opportunity to devote some time to serving the lord.  Thanks for all of the letters, emails, prayers and support.  I love all of you and wish the best for you!!

General Conference; Mission age announcement!?! New comanion Elder Stevens

Whats up everyone!!  How is it going?  Its been a great week here with my new companion Elder Stevens.  I already know him well because he was in the other companionship that worked here in Vera Cruz.  Its been really good working together so far.  I thought that it would be so much worse and a lot more lonely living here just us two, but really its been kinda nice.  Its more peaceful now, being a lot easier to clean clothes now and we have more time to shower and get ready.  Because we combined 2 areas into 1 we have a ton of investigators now.  Its been kind of crazy but having the problem of too many investigators is one of the better problems to have :)  But we are hoping that we can keep up the same pace with just us two as it was when it was us 4 so we are gonna have to be working hard.  Haha its also been nice with all of our recent converts that we are teaching because they usually have friends or family over so we are teaching a lot more "lessons with member present" which is always a good thing.  The highlight of the week of course was watching general conference.  It was a lot more difficult to understand in Portuguese  but it still was a great and spiritual enriching experience.  And how about the big announcement!?!?  I was sooo surprised by it and I imagine that its making quite a stir there in Utah county. I can think of so many different people that I know that could turn there papers in today if they wanted to.  Haha and I also thought to myself right when it was announced that Kyle could be on a mission before I get back.  Wow that's such a crazy thought, I'm crossing my fingers that he isn't able to leave too quickly ;)  Sorry for writing a short email, I just don't have too much news today.  Did you guys get the letter from mission ties yet?  That one was a little more detailed.  But do you guys have any questions for me?  Thanks for all the emails and keep on sending them :D  I love you all.

Elder

Happy October; One area in Vera Cruz is closing; Six baptisms!!

Hey there, Happy October.  So we were really anxious to see the transfer news so we came here earlier than usual.  One of the areas here is closing :( but it looks like Im gonna stay here with Elder Stevens while Elder Escobar and Nagliati are transferred.  Im kinda bummed because we were hoping that both areas would stay opened and I wanted to have one more transfer with my dad, but Im really glad that I am staying here in Vera Cruz.  Elder Stevens is a cool guy so it should be a good transfer :)  On saturday we had the 6 baptisms!  It was a great day and one of the most amazing thing that Ive ever experienced.  There is a lot to write about so Im gonna send a mission ties letter about the rest and just send some pictures right now.  We will probably come back and quickly read e-mails later today.  Bye bye!