another week

Querida Familinha,
Ola boa tarde! Guess what: it is so hot and we sweat so much that we are losing weight! It´s been around 100º for like two weeks, and since nowhere has A/C, we are pretty much constantly sweating. We have a nickname for it; sworpo- sweaty corpo (body). To keep cheerful Sister Cutler and I always ask each other: How´s your sworpo? Also we always tell each other that "it´s not sweat, it´s the glow of the gospel".
This week was really great. On Monday night we had a ward noite familiar ( FHE). We tried to make a cake for it, but.. well we didn´t have the right ingredients, and then we cooked it really weird, and for too long... so it was really gross. But we left it in the kitchen and I think the other Sisters ate some of it, so maybe it wasn´t too bad. Hopefully.
On Tuesday we went to get bus passes so we can go to Santa Maria da Feira more. Turns out you have to have a picture, so we went by a white wall, took a picture, went across the street and printed it, and came back. The poor guy at the counter is so sick of us (we go all the time asking about buses and trains and things), so when we came back to pick them up and saw that they spelled my name wrong, he just said it was fine. So now I have a bus pass for Sister "Oridney". (Maybe I should work on my handwriting).
Wednesday we had ZONE CONFERENCE! That means MAIL! I had a few letters waiting for me... So that was great. There is only one brand-new missionary in our zone (a lot of people are new to the zone but not to Portugal). Álso some of the missioanries told me I speak really well, especially for it only being my second transfer, so that was nice. After zone conference we came back to São João and tried to go to a lesson with Renata (a ward missionary). But turns out every city has the same street names... so we were in the wrong city. We started walking and Renata was praying for a taxi, when one drove up! So we took a taxi to our compromisso. It was only like 3 minutes driving. So now I´ve been in a taxi. We had our lesson with André.. he is ELECT. We stopped him by the bus stop on our way home one night and he was like "Yeah come teach me". Also he speaks perfect English and is a doctor. And rock climbs so that´s cool. But we called him on Saturday to ask about reading and give him the address for the capela in Porto (a lot of weekends he gives conferences to nurses there and said he would like to go to church even if he was there). He had read the chapter we left, and started at the beginning of the Book of MOrmon and was in 2 nephi 13 already! And he said he could come to church here! Sister C and I were so happy we just like screamed and hugged each other.
Also on Wednesday we marked Mario for baptism at the end of July :) He is this little old man we met with a pitchfork. He can´t really read. He quit smoking in two days and is always so happy. But we are not sure how much he actually understands of our lessons (sometimes he seems to get it and other times he is really distracted) so we want to have a few weeks to make sure he is ready).
Independence day! We sung the national anthem during companion study... Also on Tuesday after English class we had a piece of watermelon to celebrate. But that´s all. It is super weird that July 4th isn´t a thing here. Besides being a normal day. Umm also on Thursdaywhen we went to get our bus passes we went to wash our hands in the bathroom... we accidentally went into the men´s. Sister Cutler went around corner and was suddenly pushing me out "OH NOPE THIS IS THE MEN´S". So that was awkward.
On Saturday we had to go back to Porto for a stake missionary conference thing... We got some pastries on the way (i´ll send a picture ... My face is shiny with sweat). But they asked all the missionaries there to sing Called to Serve... In the chorus after the second line (Cumprir fiel missão) in zone conference we shout "Portugal Portugal!" and then keep singing. So when we got to that line, we all cut off on "missão".. And you could tell we all almost screamed it. So let´s hope I don´t do that in sacrament meeting sometime.

So church is really weird for people. Yesterday I was sitting next to a pesquisador in sacrament meeting. He was watching really intently, obviously because it was so new. They passed the bread and it was fine. But when they were passing the water to the people on the stand, he leaned over and said quietly "Okay now I´m really worried about breaking these tiny glasses". I almost laughed but manage to just say "Don´t worry they´re plasitc". But I am still laughing about it on the inside.
Yesterday evening we walked to a town called Escapães. We saw the most beautiful sunset over the ocean. It was a nice way to end the week.
Yep that´s about all. This week we have another zone meeting and we´ll have splits again, so it´s looking to be a great week :)
I hope everything is well with you all. I love you tons!
Love, Sister Gidney (Oridney)
:)

summerrrr

ola familia!
Suddenly it´s like I live on the sun. It is SO hot. It was about 41º this week... I´m not sure what that is in farenheit but I think it´s about 105. Plus however much humidity... I sweat so much that I feel like I just got out of the shower and didn´t dry off before getting dressed. It´s pretty gross. The worst part was that we only had one fan in our apartment (there´s no air conditioning or anything) and so it was SO hot at night that we all woke up probably every hour. Also I kept waking up on the floor - I guess it was cooler down there than in my bed. But Presidente Vasco (the ramo presidente) gave us like 3 more fans from the capela storage, so now we sleep lots better :)
I can´t believe it´s almost the fourth of July! What are you doing this year? Sister Cutler and I will celebrate, probably with a fartura... I also colored my planner on that day to look like an American flag. `Merica. Also here´s a scripture for independence day: Alma 10:6. (Read it. Get it?)
Also I think I never told you. My scripture of the transfer is Isaiah 41:10. I picked it because sometimes we get discouraged because no one wants to listen, but we don´t need to because Heavenly Father is helping us. Also I like the phrase "upheld with the right hand of my righteousness". That made me think of 2 things. 1. When we are righteous, we can be found at the right hand of God. So when we do our part, we will be where we need to be for Him to support us. 2. When we sustain people in church, we uphold our right hands. So basically God is sustaining us. He is saying He knows we´re worthy and able of this calling, and that He will do all He can to help us magnify it. So I liked that. I am going to try to memorize it in Portuguese.
The best part about this week was watching Paulo´s conversion continue. He helped pass the sacrament for the first time yesterday. It was amazing to see someone use their priesthood for the first time. And after church, another pesquisador was looking at a picture of President Monson, and Paulo went over to explain "That´s the prophet. He´s alive. Joseph Smith restored the gospel but he isn´t alive anymore. This one is living." And even though it was just a simple explanation to him, hearing Paulo (an ex-smoker, drug-addict, etc) bear testimony like it was second nature was maybe the most beautiful thing I think I have ever heard.
The mission president broadcast was amazing. The four of us here (us and Sisters Valdez and Warner) got to watch yesterday.. in ENGLSH. It made me miss the Marriot center (ha) but also it was amazing. Especially that musical medley with the missionary family. I want to be like that someday.
We got fed by members like 3 times this week. Portuguese food is soooo good! I am glad that we have exercise time every morning... Also I have been going running with Sister Warner twice a week. (Sister Cutler likes to go the other days). On Saturday we ran two miles without stopping. Take that, asthma.
Two pesqusiador milagres:
1. We had this pesq., Rosaly, who didn´t want to talk to us anymore. She has two adorable little kids. She got a job and said she was two busy, even though she used to want to be baptized. But yesterday we felt like we should pass by, so we did to invite her to the family night the ramo is having tonight. She said she will come, and that we can start teaching her again!
2. Bernardo. He wants to be baptized, but is scared of what his parents think. But he came to church (he hasn´t been since my first Sunday), and it letting us meet his family to talk to them so he can get baptized!
I am starting to be a weird missionary- everything reminds me of a hymn or scripture. But I LOVE IT HERE. São João is probably the best area in the whole world.
I hope everyone is having a great summer. I am sending a little package-ish thing this week or next for you all; hope you enjoy it. Did Dad and Jeremy get my letters? Don´t get heat stroke and have a great week!
I love you tons,
Sister Gidney

TRANSFER 2

Ola familia!
First, happy birthday to Jeremy! I thought about how I was missing the cake yesterday. But then I realized that you all would still be asleep the night before so I felt better. Hope he had a good day. I can´t believe he´s 17. Crazy.
This week was great! Also first good news. I didn´t get transferred-our whole district is staying here for another transfer. I´m really excited. Our district is pretty great.
So this week on Tuesday we had divisões with the sister training leaders. They came down here and so there were two companionships working in our area. Sister Wilde was working with me. It was really great-I learned a lot and I think I am braver now. Also I don´t know what it changed but Sister Cutler and I are going crazy now. The week before last we found like 3 novos (new investigators), and this week we found 21. We want to keep improving but this was a great jumpstart.
The best thing this week was that Paulo finally got baptized!! 4 nonmembers came, too, which was really great. His dad came as a surprise. And Paulo is like a completely different person (but he still won´t smile for pictures).

                                                 

This week it suddenly got really hot. Also the bugs came out. The insects here look like aliens. I have 7 bug bites.
Today Sister Cutler and I bought some short-sleeve shirts. I couldn´t help but think, "I´m buying clothes in EUROPE". I feel fancy.
So the work is going really well, except for one problem. A lot of the time we run into people who are more interested in us, than in our message... There have been several young men who have texted us (we can recieve texts but can´t send them) saying we are pretty and they want to hang out with us. We obviously don´t respond. If they call we just invite them to church.
I think I am starting to love being a missionary. I was thinking about it while we were waiting to find out about transfers yesterday and I will be really sad to leave São João... and I don´t even want to think about leaving Portugal. It´s really pretty here, but also I am starting to love the people. Even though they don´t have teeth and have hairy ears. Also, I even am getting used to old ladies kissing my face. And it´s still really hard sometimes, and I am SO tired all the time, but I also am usually really, really happy. I´m not even sure why. It´s weird. And also great. So yeah.
Sorry this is so random. My brain is all scattered. We have a dinner appointment tonight with a member (finally. haha). How is the summer going? How hot is it in Utah?
I´m attaching some pictures of Portugal :)
I miss you all and love you tons!
Eat a quesadilla for me/love,
Sister Gidney                                                   

The beach and the rain

Hi familia,
First sorry this will be kind of short-we went to the beach today so I don´t have much time to write :)
The weather here is CRAZY. It was really hot, and then started raining like crazy. I like the rain though. It´s like I´m in Seattle, except no one speaks English.
This week Paulo quit smoking! It´s crazy how much the gospel can change people. Seriously he smoked for 24 years and then quit basically overnight. It is really exciting.
On thursday we had a zone meeting in Porto, so I got to see Sister Carroll and Miles and Brand and Elder Beckstrand. It was a cute little reunion.
We had a talent show in the ramo on Friday night. One man sang Fado? Traditional Portuguese music. It was really good-watch some on YouTube or something.
Our district went to the beach in Espinho today. It was raining and kind of cold so we were the only ones on the sand but it was SO fun. It was a great stress relief-and I got to put my toes in the Atlantic Ocean for the first time!
We dropped or were dropped by like all of our investigators this week... Except for a couple. So we are hoping to find a lot more this week. We have started planning where to tract and then praying that there will be people there. I´ll let you know how it goes.
I hope you had a Happy Father´s Day without me. I´m sure it was rough, ha.
Okay that´s all I have the time I have for now-But I love you all tons! And miss you!
Love you,
Sister Gidney
P.s. There is a castle in our area too-the pictures are of the beach and that. Love you!

The beach and the rain

Hi familia,
First sorry this will be kind of short-we went to the beach today so I don´t have much time to write :)
The weather here is CRAZY. It was really hot, and then started raining like crazy. I like the rain though. It´s like I´m in Seattle, except no one speaks English.
This week Paulo quit smoking! It´s crazy how much the gospel can change people. Seriously he smoked for 24 years and then quit basically overnight. It is really exciting.
On thursday we had a zone meeting in Porto, so I got to see Sister Carroll and Miles and Brand and Elder Beckstrand. It was a cute little reunion.
We had a talent show in the ramo on Friday night. One man sang Fado? Traditional Portuguese music. It was really good-watch some on YouTube or something.
Our district went to the beach in Espinho today. It was raining and kind of cold so we were the only ones on the sand but it was SO fun. It was a great stress relief-and I got to put my toes in the Atlantic Ocean for the first time!
We dropped or were dropped by like all of our investigators this week... Except for a couple. So we are hoping to find a lot more this week. We have started planning where to tract and then praying that there will be people there. I´ll let you know how it goes.
I hope you had a Happy Father´s Day without me. I´m sure it was rough, ha.
Okay that´s all I have the time I have for now-But I love you all tons! And miss you!
Love you,
Sister Gidney
P.s. There is a castle in our area too-the pictures are of the beach and that. Love you!

 

another week

Ola familia,
This week was pretty great. On Monday night, Linda got baptized!! We realized we forgot to tell her to plug her nose so it was a little awkward, but she looked SO happy. When she got comfirmed yesterday, she had the biggest smile on her face. She keeps telling us "Every day I get happier and happier". :) It´s so great. 

On Tuesday we were contacting people na rua, and the funniest thing happened. I went over to this old guy with a dog and was trying to ask the dog´s name, because it seemed like a good way to start the conversation. He was saying something that neither SIster Cutler nor I could understand, but then suddenly he leaned over and KISSED HER. On the cheek, but only because she turned. She was like "No não podemos fazer isso!!" and he like laughed and then tried to do it again. He was just laughing this creepy little old man laugh and trying to kiss her and I was trying SO hard not to laugh. We walked away pretty quickly.
We are teaching this nice boy, Bernardo, who already thinks the Church is true. He asked what more he needs to do to get baptized, but he is a little nervous to talk to his parents about the Church, because they don´t really like it. But we have a lesson with him tonight, and we are hoping to mark him, and practice how he will tell his parents he wants to get baptized.
Oh also I contacted some people all by myself this week. One lady at the bus stop, who was really nice. And then I got really lucky, I went up to talk to this guy while Sister Cutler was on the phone with the district leader, and I started trying to tell him who I was. He stopped me and said "Sorry do you know English becuase I´m Australian"! It just goes to show that when we are trying, the Lord will enable us to do His will... whether by giving the gift of tongues, or giving me people who speak English, haha.
Yesterday was crazy. After church, the other sisters´pesquisador Tiago got baptized. He is 19 but is more "like a criança" and he was SO excited, especially because he had to get interviewed twice (he didn´t remember enough the first time). But they didn´t have 2 Melchezidek priesthood holders there to be witnesses so the choir director had to leave to go pick up a ward member, so President Vasco and Tiago were just standing in the font in the cold water for like 15 minutes while everyone just looked at them. It was kind of awkward... but they got a witness and he got baptized. So two people got baptized into the ramo this week :) we are hoping the members see that we are taking this seriously and will start giving us a lot of referrals.
Last night we had the weirdest coincidences that I don´t have time to explain but in the end, all four of us (me, Sis Cutler, Sis Valdez, and Sis warner) ended up teaching together, to a menos-ativo and his friend who is not a member. The non-member is really nice, but she thinks she can´t be forgiven. It was so sad, she was saying how she can see purity in our eyes and wishes she could have that. We are hoping to teach her more and help her gain a testimony of the Atonement.
Oh so I guess today is some sort of holiday because EVERYTHING was closed. We are at the capela emailing right now because the library and the internet cafe and every other place in town was fechado. It´s weird how we don´t know about any of these things.
Okay I´m attaching a picture of Linda´s baptism and one of my face so you can see that I am not dead.
Oh one more funny thing. Only about half the ramo can say "Gidney" so the Relief Society president starting calling me "blue eyes" (why they know that in English but can´t say Gidney, I don´t know) so now a bunch of members call me that. Better than "one of the sisters who doesn´t know Portuguese".
I think that is pretty much all. I ate a delicious pastry this week that cost less than a euro. Yep that´s all. Okay have a great week :)
I love you all lots,
Sister Gidney

Week ? aka gypsies, sore feet, and picnics

Ola familia!
I realized that last week was memorial day. It´s so weird that holidays are different here. But even though there was no Memorial Day, on Saturday we got to help out with a branch picnic. And guess what, we even got to wear pants! It was soooo weird.
So we had a cool experience on Wednesday. We took a bus to Santa Maria da Feira and we were trying to visit menos ativos. Our appointments all either cancelled or took way less time than we expected so we had about an hour before the bus came. So we were wondering what we should do, and Sister Cutler said we should pray (which it´s still kind of weird for me to like stand and a street corner and pray... but we did) and we felt like we should go down this esquisito little alley. So we went down there and I felt like we should go to the second door and we went and, oh by the way it was pouring rain this whole day, and this lady answered and let us in, I think maybe because we looked so pitiful and wet. But we started teaching her, and then her husband. And they want to come to church and said we are welcome anytime. They were really really nice and I am excited to teach them again to see what happens.
On Thursday we met a nice gypsy man (there are a lot of gypsies here) on the rua and we tried to give him a pamphlet but he couldn´t read so wouldn´t take it. But as we were leaving Sister Cutler tried to shake his hand and he kissed her hand. He held out his hand to me and I saw it so I went for the shake, I was pumping up and down pretty vigorously, but he like timed his face against the shake and kissed my hand anyway. So I´m not sure how I feel about that.
Also on Thursdya, I HAD MY FIRST REAL CONVERSATION WITH A PORTUGUESE PERSON BY MYSELF. So we were near-ish to our apartment and Sister Cutler was calling our next appointment and we saw one of our pesquisadores. She was still on the phone so I started talking to him and we talked about how many missionaries are in Portugal and what a mission president is and how we don´t choose our mission or our areas, we get assigned, and we understood each other! It was so cool! And I haven´t really understood anyone since then but that´s okay.
Hey guess what- Linda is getting baptized tonight :) I am so excited for her. Her and Paulo both already seem like part of the ramo. They come to church the whole 3 hours every week and he comes to activities and English classes and everything. They are both so much happier and it´s really cool to see the gospel changing them.
Speaking of the ramo (branch), the members love us. They are always complimenting us and calling us about missionary appointments and things like that. And there is this little 12-year-old boy that always hangs out with us at church, plus the young women always follow us around. I love it.
One more thing really quick. I decided I´m going to pick like a theme scripture for every transfer. Last week I was reading in the Book of Mormon during personal study and I read Alma 38:12 so that´s the one I picked for this transfer, because RMs always talk about how much they love the people, and I want to love these Portuguese people, even though they never brush their teeth and are really hairy, so I picked this one because it says how to be filled with love. And it basically tells you how to be a good missionary, like when you´re teaching. "Use boldness, but not overbearance;" (you have to be bold, but you don´t want to be annoying and force people into it) "also see that ye bridle all your passions, that ye may be filled with love" (you have to forget all the things you loved to do, like facebook or pinterest or going on roadtrips or sleeping in. You have to have ´both feet in the mission´ or you won´t love the people.) "see ye that ye refrain from idleness" (I´m here to work!) So yeah that´s my theme for this transfer. I like it. Amen?
That´s about all. We walk 400 miles every day and teach a lot and also get turned down a lot but I´m starting to get to the point where I am liking being here. It´s not as weird anymore, so that´s good. I still get overwhelmed a lot but I think I am learning a lot. About Portuguese and the gospel and myself. So it´s pretty cool. I miss you all a lot and love you lots!
Have a great week-don´t party too hard with school getting out :)
Love,
Sister Gidney