Elder John Hiatt's Mission Blog

Hello family and friends, This week was Christmas. We spent most of that time at the house of the family of one of the members of our ward, talking with families at home and eating. I received several presents from various people: From my parents directly: * 1 homemade calendar composed of pictures of the Hiatt kids collected over the last 20 years From my parents indirectly (by way of a missionary delivery service in Brazil): * 1 case of chocolates * 1 package of Oreos * 1 can of Strawberry Nesquick milk drink mix From my mission president: * 2 peanut candy things * 1 Lollipop with a chewy core (not a tootsie pop) * 1 package of Mentos * 1 Twix * 1 fancy São Paulo Oeste study journal * 1 fancy São Paulo Oeste water bottle * 1 toothbrush, which is important because of all this candy I got. From my companion: * Jesus, o Cristo, which is a really cool book that explains basically everything we know about the existence premortal, mortal, and postmortal of Jesus Christ. * Músicas para Cria...

Hello family and friends, This week we had all of the Christmas parties. On Thursday, we had our mission Conferência de Natal (Christmas Conference). Half of the missionaries of the São Paulo Oeste mission were there (the other half had their conference on Wednesday), so I got to meet a few of them. We had breakfast, then a few lessons about Christmas from our mission president, President Horsley, then lunch, then activities and such. There was a randomized gift exchange, in which I got a lego parrot, and I got to decorate cookies. I took a picture of mine, but still don't know how to get it onto the computer to send it, so you will need to wait a bit longer. Also this week was the ward Christmas dinner. It officially started at 6:00 on Saturday night. My companion and I showed up at about 6:15 and started talking to the people who were already there. At 7:05, the bishop got on the stage and made the announcement that they were going to actually start and ad the opening prayer. At ...

Hello family and friends, This week, we got a lot of rain. It rains a lot here in São Paulo. When it rains really hard and we aren't in or near a house for a lesson, my companion and I generally take cover in a restaurant somewhere close by, and in these restaurants there is almost always a TV showing the news, with the recurring headline: "Olha a chuva!", which means "Look at the rain!", with pictures of how different areas of São Paulo are super flooded. Everywhere in my area is fine though, just wet from all the rain that comes down. When it isn't actively raining here, it is almost always really hot. Today the high is 31 or 32, which is about 90 for those of you who use Fahrenheit. Also, being near the coast, it is very humid, so the heat feels hotter. And when I say "not actively raining", it is hot immediately before and immediately after the rain too. Here it is very hot and very wet. And now, the weather. O Seu Amor Milênios atrás em um bel...

Hello family and friends, I have now been in Brazil for three months, evenly divided between the CTM and the field. I have had to talk to people, which is still difficult. I have studied the scriptures a lot, and taught a lot of lessons. Not as many as I expected from what I heard in the CTM (up to 15 or so per day, where reality has been maybe 15 in the last week), but still a lot. There have been several days in which nothing that was planned actually happened, and a lot of things that weren't planned did happen. We opened this area, meaning that immediately before us there weren't missionaries here, and before that the missionaries weren't very good, so we didn't have a lot to start with. We currently have 18 people that we've been able to meet with more than once, and a few more that we've seen once and will probably continue trying to contact a few more times. Some people are progressing more than others, but everyone we are teaching is in some way progress...

(note from the editor: My apologies for posting this late... I was on vacation and totally forgot!) Hello family and friends, First off, I happen to know that there was a birthday this week, on the 22nd of November. Therefore, happy birthday to Irmã Braz, one of my instructors in the CTM. (I'm not actually allowed to email her directly, since she lives in my mission, but someone could pass this on to her.) Here in Osasco, this week was fairly normal. We taught some more lessons. We invited another person to be baptized. We found some more people to teach. Some members recommended more families to teach, which is even better. This saturday, the ward had a missionary activity where some of the members stood outside the chapel and invited people passing by to come to church the next day and learn more about it. Honestly, if every day of missionary life was like those two hours, we would convert the entire world. Oh yeah, also, there was another birthday this week, also on the 22nd....

Hello family and friends, A note about dogs: They can't talk. At least, I haven't met any that speak English or Portuguese, so I can't communicate directly with them. However, they bark a lot, which is probably some form of communication, and combined with what they do, it is possible to make a reasonable guess as to what they are trying to say. Here are some example transcripts of our dealings with dogs, based on real events. 1. (Meu companheiro: Claps and calls for the person we're trying to teach) Dog: (walks out to the gate) Hey! Peoples! Leave! You're weird! I don't like you! Leave! (Starts to walk away) (Meu companheiro: Tchau.) What was that? You want to say that to my face? Come on! I dare you! Do it! Leave! I dare you! (Starts to walk away) (Meu companheiro: Tchau.) You're still here? I don't like you! Leave! I dare you! Do it! (This continues until either a person comes out or we stop waiting and move on to someone else.) 2...