When It Rains, It Pours

1. Rainy Days
This week was superrrr good! We had 4 days of Brazilian rainstorms so that was a new experience! People basically just hide in their houses, so that makes our work a bit tricky. We just ran bus stop to bus stop trying to talk to people! We actually taught all of the Plan of Salvation to a woman there. After our "lesson" a huge truck drove by and drenched us all, but she said "At least God gave me 1 good thing today: you guys!"

2. Church Talk
This week I had my first talk in church! I knew it was bound to come eventually. Whenever a speaker falls through one of the Elders gets the opportunity to prepare a talk 5 minutes before the meeting:)) I wasn't super stressed, I just got up there and talked! Turns out it was 9 minutes too! I mispronounced 'calçadão' which means main street, and apparently said something else so people laughed at me, but all in all it went well!

3. Embarrassing Moment
This week wasn't my hottest.. We had the baptism of one a kid in the ward this week, and we had more people come to his baptism party than to a sacrament meeting! They asked me to lead the music for the opening song, and their was a slight breakdown of communication. I thought he said we would only have 1 verse, so after the first verse I gave a thumbs up and sat down, but everyone kept on going! By the time I stood back up everyone was looking at me laughing, cause my music leading skills are less than sufficent, but the baptism went really well so it all worked out!

4. The sacrifice of missionaries
I've had the chance to talk to a ton of missionaries who are from pretty humble circumstances, and it makes me so grateful for what I have! Some missionaries were only baptized themselves 1 year ago, others sold everything they have just to be here, the stories never end! I´m truly humbled to see the sacrifice of people to fulfill the missionary calling!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas Break! Love you all!
Elder Rawson

It took over a month -- but the package from home arrived!

sunset on New Years Eve was spectacular

my selfie game wasn't on point this week.... 0/1 

my selfie game wasn't on point this week.... 0/2

Mission Christmas Video filmed in the city center.  Elder Rawson says the second portion "is hilarous".  Since we don't understand Portuguese or Brazilian missionary humor, we'll have to take his word for it!