Question and Answer

1. How did you celebrate your birthday?

1.  My companion made a happy birthday sign for me and taped it on my bed.  President and Sister Sici called me this morning and sang to me- I think they forgot that it was yesterday.  I had the runs, all our appointments fell through, and I was called on to give an impromptu talk, but today we had a festa at the sisters´ casa.  Sister K made me a really pretty, but not so good tasting cake.  Sister Oliveira made me ´´chocolate chip cookies´´, Sister Nascimento made me cheese bread, and Sister dos Santos made us all lunch.  I brought acai and they all sang to me.  It was really fun.

2. What is the name of your area?

2.  Area:  Satelite

    Zone: Icoaraci (I´m in the same zone Eric´s brother was in once)

   Location: about an hour and a half bus ride from the mission home in belem

3. Does it rain everyday? Are the streets paved where you are?

3. It was raining every day, but now it hardly rains ever, which is worse!  It´s so hot!  I actually got really, really burnt the other day, so now I´ve decided to carry around sun screen with me.  Ouch.

3.5.  I work in a lot nicer area than most places.  The people have a bit more money, so most of our area is ´´paved´´ and people have cars and TVs.  There are some parts of our area, though, where we have to walk on these sketchy wood plank bridges to get to houses on stilts above some pretty diseased water.  I´m seriously trying to forget any knowledge i have about germs and cleanliness.  I doesn´t exist here.  People ask me how the US is different from here- there´s like not even a place to begin, but while it´s really easy to notice all the more negative things, there´s a lot of really good things about this part of Brazil too.  It´s just so poor!