hey mom and dad
so, yes i got your whole email last week. i was just a little frustrated and stressed, haha, but that never happens to me right? ;) but the mission rule on going home is that i can go to bele horizonte. what it is, is that the mission usually buys the tickets to São Paulo then the church will buy my ticket to the US. so, what will happen is, we will talk to são paulo to buy the ticket for the end of the week or whenever you guys are wanting to come back. then the mission will buy my ticket to bele horizonte, then we will have to buy a ticket from there to são paulo to catch my flight back to the US. we just did that for a missionary that is going home two transfers before me. it will be nice cuz i'm in here, so i will be the one setting it all up and buying the plane tickets so it doesnt just get lost somewhere between the lines. i think we buy my tickets in july. i'm excited to see st Claire. i will get to speak portuguese with him, weird! if you want any other information just ask me. but anyways, i loved general conference. my favorite talk was either Elder Richard G. Scott about eternal families, Elder Oaks about desire or Elder Christofferson about correction in our lives. his parable of that little tree that was cut down so that it could grow and produce fruit, i really liked that one! did you hear the prophet talking about manaus? everyone went crazy here haha. he is gonna be here in january for the temple dedication, i think. i'm sad i'm gonna miss that! i really enjoyed general conference. it gave me a time where i didn't have to worry about finances and just sit and learn and feel the spirit. its really amazing what the words of our modern day prophets can do to us. i really like a scripture about what can happen if we let it in, Mosiah 5:1-2, really almost all of chapter five. i never realized before the mission how important a living prophet really is to us and what we can accomplish listening to their words and applying them to our lives. i liked the end talk of conference. elder holland gave us a good wake up call of how important these talks we hear really are and how we better be listening cuz the lord will make his voice heard. so conference was way good, but then comes monday and the rush starts all over again haha. i have not stopped since monday! i didnt get a p day today (for the third week in a row) and i have been working from morning till late at night trying to get everything done. It is just great how people wait till the last sec to need something paid, right mom, haha. i get this call from one of the little cities here in amazonas and they say, "well you guys are paying for our trip to the temple (what president Monson was talking about) and it has to be payed by ten a-clock thursday morning." but then they through the loop in it, "it is six thousand Reais!!!!" me "well, i only get a five thousand reai allotment per week, president Jayme. how am i gonna do this?" President Jayme "well that's why you are the financial secretary. figure it out." haha, o man am i learning on the mission!!!! i think i got it now though. president jayme is a college professor for sure, cuz he knows how to make you learn. he knows all of this. he is great with "buisness running" (i forgot the word for that), but he lets us figure it out on our own to teach us. it's his famous phrase here in the office "well what are you gonna do about that?" haha. maybe this is the Lord's way of whipping me into shape with my personal finances haha. i have literally been up to my eyes in work this week though. this is the first break from it i have got for the last three days. but then i will get it done and it will be slow again. haha. i'm sure you have no clue what that's like do you mom ;) o, i got a new companion too. six americans got here last night from the states, so there was a transfer in the middle of the transfer. i am now with Elder Garcia. he is cool. my other companion was so mad he was leaving the area, haha, and it wasn't just left to the area next to this but moved to a different state in the mission, haha. right about now he is probably roasting as he is standing right on the equator, haha, while i still have my air conditioning. but things are going good, just really tired!!!! we are allowed to stay up and finish our work, so i get to use my days, when its allowed, for us to catch up on our sleep the next few days to recuperate. i love you guys! o and my package hasn't got here yet.