Weekly Letter!

WOOOOOO!! It was a really good week. And a really fast one. We had a lot of cool experiences!

I forgot to mention it in my last email but last Saturday we did a service project for "Moãs que Ajudam" (Helping Hands). It was really super cool. We went to some schools that needed some help with clearing out old metal desks and overall really just needed to be cleaned. So we stayed at the first school for a little while and got dirty and then made our way over to a little nicer school and were supposed to paint it. But, we prepped it and everything and got it all ready but then the people that were supposed to bring the paint never showed... Africa... Haha there´s no real sense of time here. Everyone kinda just goes with the flow. But, it was still way nice to be able to get out and serve! It was really cool to see how once people saw us working they all wanted to jump in. Service is contagious!

This week we had a really cool opportunity to go to an orphanage and play with the kids. Elder Richter knows someone from back home that is here for her husbands work and voulunteers at this orphanage everweek and invited us to come and help.  It was the coolest thing, the kids were so awesome! They did a little program for us and sang and then just hung out and played games and stuff with us. It was actually a fairly nice orphanage there were probably about 30 kids, ranging from 5 to 18. Individually they don´t have families but together they are all definitely one big family. They invited us to come back and do it every week and we were super excited about that:) We´re going to help teach them English and stuff out the Book of Mormon and our Pamphlets. Haha. They are already very happy but I can´t imagine how happy they would all be if they had the gospel in their lives. It was a really super cool experience! I love the kids!

So Elections are going to be this week and we are the first set of missionaries here for elections so we don´t really know what to expect quite yet so we´re going to be very cautious. Elections happen every 5 years. The actual election day is Friday and President Thompson (Who still isn´t here) has decided that we´ll all stay in our houses that day just to be safe. And a few days before and after be inside at about 6. You´re probably wondering why elections are so crazy haha. And frankly I don´t really know all that much. But, we´re just going to be safe because all of the different parties like to get together and drink and you never know when a riot could start or something crazy like that. I´ll update you on how it went next week:)

Elder Hobbs and I had a really good week. Yesterday we taught a Portuguese man named Sebastião, and he comitted to be baptized  so we were pretty excited about that!

My Portuguese is still comin´. I get frustrated at times but I just need to remember that all this is done in the Lord´s way and in the Lord´s time. I think that kind of applies to everything in life. I truly have fallen in love with this country and its people. I can´t wait to be able to communicate with them in the way that I want to:) I mention it in all of my letters, but these people are so ready! There´s not a single person that I´ve met that has been rude to us or shut us down. We´ve just need to build a strong foundation before we can let this country explode with the gospel! Which it will!

My testimony has grown a lot this last week. I have been studying really hard and found some really awesome, eye opening things in the scriptures. I love the scriptures! We are really blessed as missionaries with a lot of time to study, it is imperative that we take advantage of the time that we have.

This place is home now. All of the weird things are starting to be not so weird. I´m loving every minute of it!!

Thanks for all of the updates and pictures! I love you all!!

Shout out to Mom and Dad on 25 years!!! Yall are the best!!!!

Elder Hyde

Lukie! For 6! Nice work brotha!

Con good work onthe first week! Keep it up bruh.

Sam, good to hear that your killing it in Tennis!

Syd, good to hear about your friends! And stop flippin people off.

Love you guys!!

1. This one is of Rebecca and Peugar. They were baptized about 2 months ago and are awesome. They moved here from S. Africa about a year ago, so they speak English, which is really nice.:)

2. Elder Davis and I at the Helping Hands project.

3. Elder Davis, Richter, Hobbs, and I at the helping Hands thing.

4. Sweet view of part of Luanda

5. Most of the mission playing some soccer!