May 14, 2012

So yesterday was the 2nd time on the mission using Skype with the family. And it ROCKED. MY DADS BEARD!!!!!!!! SOOOOO AWESOME! Its weird to think that 5 months have already passed since the last time that I saw everybody at Christmas, and even weirded to think the next time I see everybody again will be next Christmas. But the time will pas even quicker now until then. As the mission goes along everything goes by a whole lot quicker then the day before. I've gone from counting days, to weeks, to months and now I only think in transfers for how long I've been out on the mission. Things just pass by too quickly to think about it any other way.
But so yesterday was awesome, and I'll just give a quick summary of the things from this past week even though my family and James have basically heard it all already. So the first thing is that this week I ate.... HORSE! What the flip?!?! Apparently its a normal thing here, but my companion only told me it was horse a few hours after I ate it and I flipped haha. I was just like that's not a normal thing, in the US we ride and race horses we don't EAT THEM. Even worse was that I didn't taste anything weird about it, and it was actually kind of good. Who knows what else I've eaten without even know it! Also, this week I talked to the most people that I've ever talked to in a week span. I stopped about 20 random people a day in the street and just started talking to them, it is a very weird thing. In the US its not normal to just stop somebody and start talking about God but here people are just totally open to it. I'm actually learning to enjoy it, I go in with no thoughts at all and just let the conversation develop, it's pretty sweet and we've met some amazing people. Hopefully this next week we will have a ton of people at church from all these contancts and families that we've talked to.
Also, my companion finished the scripture case for my Book of Mormon as is shown in the picture and it is super sweet, hes going to do one for my Bible pretty soon. Pays off to have a talented companion like this with the artsy stuff. He's also going to make me a little wooden sculpture of the Miami Heat symbol for when they win the championship this year. Because obviously that will be happening really soon here as we all know.
Well thats about it, the week passed by pretty quickly with tons of contacts and me learning to just stop people and enjoy it more.. OHH and my companion told me this week that there have been a few times in lessons and with him and stuff that I'm speaking without an American accent. He sadi that soon people will start asking me if I'm Brasilian. SCORE!
Eu Te Amo!
Elder Gleason
P.S. 2 Nephi 26: 23-24, 27
"Don't save anything for a special occasion. Every day in your life is a special occasion" (I don't think I've sent this one home yet?)
"We aren't edifying the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of God is edifying us" -Elder Lopez