Hey everyone!! 

I´m just as surprised as everyone else about this emergency transfer thing. And just when I get used to Jardim Ipê too! I´ve never seen it happen before, so who knows what´s happened with the other elders. I have no idea who´s my new companion, or my new area. But I do know that I´ll be going over to the next zone, which is actually in the same stake. So I´ll still be able to see the members at Stake activities and stuff. 

And so yesterday with the phone call from the Assistants totally threw me, Elder B. , and the rest of the ward off. I thought for sure that at the end of this transfer, at least I wouldn´t be the one going. But the Lord has a purpose in everything. We got the phone call right in the middle of a first lesson with an investigator family - bad timing Assistants!! Let me back up a little:

A week or two ago, Elder B.  and I went over to this one member´s house to introduce ourselves and talk about how we can help them do missionary work. We got talking, and after a while, they told us they have a family that lives in the same complex that would be super interested in the gospel. So they invited them over for lunch yesterday, and marked us on the lunch calendar for the same day. That family was super prepared!!! Anyways, right when we started sharing the Book of Mormon with them, we get the phone call. Elder B.  ignored it, but they called again. At that point we didn´t even care what anyone was calling about because we were just completely focused on this family. Elder B.  even took the battery out of the phone haha! But when the Assistants told me the news, I´ll be honest I was kinda mad. We´ve been having so much more success over the last couple weeks, and it´s gotten better and better!! A lot of the people we were teaching were solid, coming to church, had baptismal dates. AND we were gonna watch the first World Cup game with a member who has a 3D TV!!!! But I´m sure the Lord´s got a plan for what´s ahead. And I hope I get a Brazilian companion too so I can pick up the language a lot quicker. 

So about the World Cup, things are going CRAZY here!!! So crazy, that President del Guerso told us that we can watch all the games with Brazil playing. The only thing we have to do is that we have to watch the games in really active members´ homes, and we can´t go all crazy with face paint and stuff. BUT, when Brazil scores, we´re allowed to yell and celebrate haha. Everyone´s getting pumped for Thursday. And the people here are transforming the Favellas into a living Brazilian flag!! They paint the sidewalks, curbs, and even the trees in Green and Yellow. They hang streamers above across the streets. You see flags everywhere. It´s ridiculously awesome. I would take pictures, but there´s always people painting, hanging more stuff up, etc. This whole country´s gonna shut down on Thursday!! 

We had Stake Conference too yesterday, and we got to have it broadcasted from Salt Lake. All of it was in Portuguese. The 1st counselor in the Relief Society, Elder Ballard, and Elder Scott spoke to us. They had voiceovers for the first two speakers, but when Elder Scott came up, the words he was saying were the same coming from his mouth! The dots connected: he speaks Portuguese!!! Turns out he was in the Area Presidency of South America at one point, so he already knew a bit of Spanish and Portuguese. It was pretty cool hearing an Apostle speak another language! 

Well, who knows what´s ahead with these changes, but I´ll definitely miss everything that´s happened here. Elder B´s been a great companion, and we´ve both helped each other out during this last month. The members are amazing in every way possible. I´ve seen a ton of miracles here, and we´ve had a blast eating all the pizza with chocolate-stuffed border as we can haha.

Good luck with these last 3,5 days of school and the Dance Festival!! This week´s gonna be a blast! Make it a good one. Love you all a lot!!

Vai Brasil!  

Love Elder Nissinen