Week 51 Sept 4th, 2023

 It's been a long difficult week

Monday my comp was sick Monday night I noticed I had a bit of a sore throat but nothing much

Tuesday I woke up with the most wildly painful sore throat,

I gave a district counsel, It was great for me at least I've been realizing recently through what president Harker has taught me that the majority of the principles in preach my gospel actually apply to not just missionary work but to our lives, and so that's kind of what I've been trying to get across in my district counsels I'm trying to teach my district principles that will 1 help a lot in missionary work, but 2 if they want to can bless their lives and so far it's been going well

 we went to lunch and it was great, it was chicken stroganoff which is always good, and some acerola juice, acerola I think translates to cherry but it's not exactly the same

I made banana bread for the third time, but I didn't have butter, but my gut feeling told me I could use soy bean cooking oil as a substitute given that it's also fat

It worked but you can tell it's not the same, or at least I can, the neighbors didn't notice the difference, my comp says I should just use oil because it's cheaper, but I think that's wrong, and so imma keep buying my 2 whole dollar sticks of butter 

The Brazilians do love the banana bread I made, and like it's way easier for me to make than any other thing I've baked, and our neighbors usually give us loads and loads of bananas, it's also probably better for me to be eating banana bread than scotch bars every day

At the end of Tuesday we had an awesome visit with sebastião and his family, the reason it was awesome was for the first time ever he told us he would go to church, and he's one of those people that when he says he's gonna do it he does it 

Wednesday we went to a place to eat lunch that we found out is owned by members, and that made some of the most fire food I've eaten, beans and rice with farofa and French fries with some bife acebolado (onioned steak, haha that's a funny way to say steak cooked with onion) it was fire they gave us pasoca too! I kinda wanna eat there every day 

I also went to say a prayer in our room right before we were gonna leave, it's just that o kneeled down, and I woke up 2 hours later with my knees sore from having slept kneeling 

We went and taught a recent convert that night. And we taught another family who crazy story from the transfer before I showed up here, she got baptized but never showed up to get confirmed it's been 2 months, and we honestly visit her reasonably frequently like a least once a week, she always wants us to come over and teach her and her family. She even studies the book of Mormon, she just doesn't really seem to comprehend what she did in baptism or comprehend much that was taught to her at all, and like 3 weeks ago we laid it out for her that she was baptized by someone that has priesthood authority. She saw all the blessings in her life, but she didn't come and get confirmed, and that we aren't even sure if she can be confirmed if she came to church (or should be confirmed...) but she kinda has to choose what she wants for her life and use her agency to choose whether she wants to use her agency to follow the commandments and follow the path she started on through baptism, or to not do so, and we aren't gonna push her in any direction,  but she doesn't really seem to understand its pretty nuts but her son became a reference through Facebook. So ig we are gonna keep going over there

That night I decided during my check up calls with the district (idk what they are called in english) I decided to alsk what they learned during the district counsel, Turns out I didn't quite get the point across during the district counsel but I was able to explain it during the calls, and my district has said it's really helped them and that it's a really cool thing they learned, and that brings me a a lot of joy to see that as a district leader I'm not just wasting my time but actually making a difference in how the people in my district see the principles of the gospel and that's it's actually helping them a lot 

Thursday was fine, all week long we have been going home early for Almeida to take the medicine the doctor prescribed him, so that has been an overall bummer for the whole week and even by Thursday my sore throat was still just as bad 

Friday was also fine, we had weekly planning and the weekly planning was useful and effective

Saturday was awesome as far as missionary work goes, I was able through the weekly planning the day before to help motivate my comp and we were able to see some good fruits on saturday we were able to help a good few people come unto Christ including some members 

Also for lunch the members took us to a restaurant that was awesome. It was all you can eat and I ate all I could, it was just some really good food. It was also good to get to know the members better and that the members could help my comp out a bit, 

But let me tell you saturday night was a nightmare, my sore throat worse than ever was so painful I couldn't sleep until 4 am I was tossing and turning all night I think I got up 6 times that night to drink water to help releive my throat and to use the bathroom, I think I drank more water than is comprehendable, I slept so terribly I was just hoping and waiting for Sunday to come, 

Sunday I magically woke up at 6:30 am somehow and got ready for church,, with my voice 2 octaves lower and barely audible I took a shower and got ready for church, I was miserable but not as miserable as the night before, I continued to drink insane amounts of water to receive my throat, 

Church was awesome, sebastiao and josepha and Fernanda came to church (10 minutes late) but they came so that was a miracle, we also had 3 inactive members come to church, even better for helping sebastiao and his family feel the spirit it was Fast and testimony meeting. Our recent convert dhemirus bore an amazing testimony so that was super special, it was a Great great church meeting, 

We went to lunch after and it was churrasco (BBQ) and if I hadn't drank so much water I would have ate more because it was awesome, a member gave me some medicine I don't know I should take for my sore throat I still have, and all in all in the 24 hours from Saturday night 9pm to Sunday at 9 PM I'm pretty confidente i drank 6 whole gallons of water, our 20 liter water bottle thing ran out that day not counting how much water I drank at the church and members house, I talked to sister Harker who is in charge of our health, and she told me to drink some tea I don't have

But I made some other tea, Turns out tea is a more efficient way to receive my throat as water lasts seconds and tea lasts 20 minutes, 

Monday today. I still have the same trashy sore throat, and I'm open to any advice you guys have to help me cause it sucks