New area, and a mostly new comp, "I HAVE LOTS OF DUCKS"

 Mon, Mar 6

 I dont really no where to begin but i did talk to a drunk guy, or he talked to me,


at the end of last pday while i was still in my old area before transfers, we walked the 15 second walk from our church to our house and a drunk man, walks up to us and says "you guys speak english!?" in witch my american comp responds with "no but he does" pointing to me, so this drunk guy is just talking to me, while my comp just watches, so this drunk guy walks up me me and (dont let me forget he has a baby duck in each of his hands) he says " ISnt antonio just so awesome, like i studied civil engineering for 3 years, and he hasnt studied anything at all, and hes awesome, isnt that awesome?" My response " yes i agree" " I like when you talk to my wife, she is very white" my response "uh huh", he then puts both ducks into his left hand and starts to shake my hand but he actually just grabbed it but never shook it, he then looks me in the eyes and says " do you speak portuguese" "yes" " say marcos oliveira da silva" ( i dont remember the name but its not important) i then repeat the name, while he is still gripping my hand, he then says "that is the name of the gang family of the neighborhood..." blah blah blah, he then lets go of my hand and takes a big step back, right arm dramatically pulled back in the air hand in the shape of a hand pistol, (two baby ducks still in his left arm)  " IF ANYONE TRIES TO ROB YOU I KILL THEM!!" my response" okay." "IF ANYONE HURTS YOU OR TRIES TO I KILL THEM!!" my response " alright.." "I KILL THEM" "UNDERSTOOD? DID YOU UNDERSTAnD??!!" my response "yep got it.." "I KILL THEM" my response "understood." we then began walking again and he followed us still talking to us, "I Studied CIvil engIneEring!" "I live just a few houses that way!!!" I HAVE LOTS OF DUCKS!!" we then stop outside our door, i respond with "we actually have to leave but have a good afternoon!" he then responds with (remember one baby duck in each hand) "TAAAAKEEEE THE DUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKSSSS!!!!!!!!" (pushing both of the baby ducks aggressively into my chest, while he aggressively yells this sentence) he then stops and pulls back completely silent as if nothing weird at all had just happened. then "TAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAKKKEEEEEEE THE DUUUUUUUUUCKS!!!!!!!!!" shoving both poor baby ducks into my chest aggressively, ( what was funny is while i was talking to him early and he was offering to kill people i was just staring at the ducks thinking "i wonder if i ask him for a duck.. will he give it to me? no i don't have room in the house for a baby duck, nor money for food, it's not worth the risk, but it is a very cute baby duck...) he then stopped once again like nothing ever happened then started to walk away, one duck by each of his ears, and the ducks pecking at his ears. he says totally blushed red cheeks like he was embarrassed " aweeee they are cleaning my ears.... they says your cute...." then he walked away and we walked inside and closed and locked the door, I later realized i had talked with him in the street a few days earlier while he was completely sober, NOTEs from my comp: "Elder Bremner didn't even flinch or look concerned when the man screamed shoving the ducks into his chest telling im to take them, and when he was threatening to kill people on his behalf Elder Bremner didn't even seem concerned, he just said "yeah, ah i understand, entendi entendi, alright," in a full on straight face, one hundred percent calm,


i feel like everyone we talk to is just really weird, like it was a completely normal conversation, like it's weird to talk to normal people, with normal mannerisms, because these weird things are just normal and happen like everyday, everyone has something weird that they do, they say weird things, but it's just how life is here, it's just normal.


so i went to the bus station in the center of campinas to meet with all the missionaries to see where i would be transfered to, and learned that i would be going to the city Jaguariuna, and that my comp would be Elder Garces-Diaz, who maybe some of you might know as being my First MTC comp, before he got his visa and went to the MTC, what an exciting and new adventure, in a city that is not like campinas with a comp, who i already know, Elder Garces-Diaz is awesome, he struggles with portuguese a lot more than i do, so i'm helping him out with that, it's a whole new mission experience being with a comp who has the same amount of time as me on the mission, teaching is a little harder because of our levels in portuguese, but it's all good practice, we are in a new zone that opened, as well as a new district,


we also received a call from president saucedo a few days into this first week telling us that once they figure out the maps in area book, because there are no missionaries in the area of Amparo, that we would have both of the areas soon, and both wards, and it's really far away, and our area is huge already, our area has 4 different cities already, but i guess we will get another area on top of it soon, president saucedo told us that the other area has a house so we will be able to travel there and work their from some days and sleep there, switching off what ward we go to each sunday, we still haven't heard anything about when we will receive this area yet, maybe president will change his mind i'm not sure, but maybe we will have these two areas soon,


we went shopping to buy food and stuff, and it was a store that was as big as any smiths or walmart, and it was overwhelming because i've become extremely used to my little baby tiny stores that were near my old houses, it was a for all of you guys a normal shopping experience but for me really strange just because i truly am used to shopping at tons of tiny sketchy stores where you have to be confident and tell the butcher what meat you want, but it was just a normal store, i couldn't find any of the weird off brands i've come to like, and not to mention, granola is actually literally 8 times as expensive, which made me really upset because i like eating granola and yogurt in the morning, and really everything is more expensive in this store, and the large amount of yogurt i got expires on the 12th, so far im not a big fan of this store,even though it has everything...


this week we've spent the majority of our time teaching a couple, who are preparing for baptism, one of them she will be baptized on the 11th, and so we taught them a lot this week, they are also just super hilarious and fun to be around, we taught them the plan of salvation, they both are going to institute every week which is cool, and she is super smart, and really gets what we teach, which is super exciting every time because we meet so many people who really truly don't understand at all yet. she's also super brutally honest which is really funny sometimes, she tells Garces-Diaz that he needs to eat more so he can be happy, then 3 days later point at fat on his stomach and says look how happy he is, ( in general everyone in brazil seems to be super honest but she's just really funny) at church she just looks at my pink tie and says to her husband "look he's wearing a girls tie!" we then have a discussion me her and her husband and we come to the agreement that pink ties and the majority of pink shirts def are awesome on men. he husband made us some of the most delicious noodles i've ever eaten, idk how brazilians make food so good... she's awesome and super patient with portuguese and is giving us a bunch of pronunciation tips, and tips for the accent, which i really appreciate, because i really wanna figure out the accent we were at a lesson (not with the couple) that was supposed to be simple and fast, but i asked the woman the question how did you feel when you received the gift of the holy ghost, and she replied with not at all responding to my question even in the slightest, going on a 45 minute tangent, so we were running late and said "sorry we gotta go!" then we started running to the church, for some reason that day i had decided to bring two hardcover books of mormon and a bible, and a full water bottle in my bag, so running was exhausting, we ended up getting to the church, where the couple was waiting outside for us, and she couldn't stop laughing that she just saw two missionaries running in the streets, saying " ive never seen two missionaries running before in white shirts and ties, bags and all, nor have i seen two missionaries sweat so much.." idk why but everything she says is just hilarious its just how she says it or something,


the ward signed us up to clean the church, so we had to clean all the rooms and hallway, and another two people would clean the sacrament meeting room and the bathrooms, we swept and took out the trash then we got to mopping, i put some bleach in a bucket of water then i started throwing water all over the place, in the hallway on the floors of all the rooms, and Elder Garces-Diaz's complete dumbfounded face made it all worth is, he starts frantically asking what i'm doing, and i reply that i'm starting to mop the floors like all my brazilian comps do, him even more franticly saying, that the brazilians never do this, they just clean it like normal like we do, i quickly replied that they aren't cleaning the church with as much love as they clean their houses then. my comp kinda freaking out replies that when the other group of members show up they are going to call us idiots and ask us what the heck we are doing, i replied with why would they do that? they taught me to clean this way ( still throwing water everywhere) we then grabbed our mops, and i continually explained that when in brazil you have to clean this way. and my comp explained that its ridiculous and no one cleans this way, i then explained and demonstrated that when there is something that isn't coming off easily you need to just throw more water at it, (face palming Elder garces Diaz,) i explained that when my comp cleaned the bathroom just by throwing water at it and scrubbing it with a broom, it made our bathroom so squeaky clean that i wanted to use the bathroom, my comp assured me that the others will think this is ridiculous, unfortunately when the brasilians showed up we had already finished mopping but to my absolute delight they walked in and immediately complimented how remarkably clean the church was, and that it smelled super good, and i am never going to forget this memory, and im not letting Garces-Diaz forget either, because its hilarious


this city gives a lot of free food to the missionaries, free juice, free salgados, free pizza, its pretty cool ngl

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