Jan. 20, 2015

Hi guys!

Yesterday the library was closed, so we have a little bit of time to email today.

It was a better week with four new investigators and we set a date with one of them. His name is Sarad Sharma. He is from India, I think. He's in his 50's. When we taught him the restoration and he loved it and is very eager to learn more and find out for himself the truth of this. He is very focused on strengthening his spiritual strength through Jesus Christ and so our message for him was just what he wanted to hear. The date is for February 21. We're hoping all goes well with him.
The three other new investigators we found, Tiago, Grazi, and Rafeal, are from Brazil. We taught them the restoration as well and it was AMAZING!!! They are so golden! They were in awe at the first vision. We had Tiago read the account aloud and when he finished he looked at the picture in the pamphlet and whispered "Wow!" and then gave us a huge smile. The whole lesson we fantastic and they asked a lot of really wonderful questions and confidently accepted a baptismal invitation. The only problem is they are moving back to Brazil next week. Argh! But we will help them find the missionaries there. Tiago says that he saw Mormon missionaries in Brazil all the time in his home town and has always wanted to talk to them but never had the opportunity. I know they will join the church some day soon.

Virginia, Deosha, and Francisca are doing so well! They are solid recent converts and haven't missed a single week of church since their baptisms. Since Elder Lazaro is no longer here to speak Spanish for Francisca, she requested that we start teaching her and her husband English. So we started doing that last week and I have realized even more just how ridiculous the English language is. It's so hard to teach; there are so many rules and so many words that don't follow any of the rules! But it's been fun at the same time. I don't know how many of you remember the scene from the movie The Pink Panther where the inspector is trying to learn English and he is trying to say "I would like to buy a hamburger.", but just for fun we had them attempt saying the same thing. It was pretty much an exact reenactment of that scene except with Spanish accents instead of French and it was in person. It was so funny; we couldn't help but laugh hysterically.

Things are going well here. The weather was even more kind to us this week. We're looking forward to another good week. I love you all and I hope you all have a wonderful week!



-Elder Curtis