Well I am here in the
beautiful country of Portugal!! To be 100% honest on the flight to Portugal I
was very nervous and thinking, "What am I doing!" We stopped in Paris
and my worry increased as we traveled but once I saw the city of Lisbon from my
window seat on the airplane my nerves went away and I knew this was where I
needed to be! Lisbon is probably the
prettiest city I have ever seen! There are cobble stone streets and tall white
buildings with red rooftops, AHHH it’s amazing! We went to the mission home and
I really lucked out with my mission president. He and Sister Tavares are so
loving, even though they don’t speak English and we could hardly understand
them we felt their love. The mission home is right on the edge of Lisbon and
near the ocean overlooking the bridge and statue of Jesus Christ! We had this
big meal with President Tavares and we talked to the office missionaries. They
were telling us how much they love this mission and I got so excited! We slept the
night in the mission home and were assigned our trainers and areas the next
day! We went to the church where I met my trainer, Elder Souza, who is a Brazilian
and sooooo awesome! He is a big guy that is way funny and is so amazing! My
first area is Miratejo! It is across the bay from Lisbon.
Lisbon looks like a
mixture of Italy and San Francisco, it is seriously so pretty. Miratejo, on the
other hand, is a mix between Italy, San Fran, and South America as it is more ghetto.
There are lots of gypsies and no one here has houses, they all live in tall
apartment buildings. Also people don’t have dryers so everywhere there are
clothes hanging to dry which makes everything so colorful! The cobble stone is
everywhere and hurts your feet but looks so cool. The people here are very
diverse--there is no dominant race! Also the girls here are so beautiful, it’s
hard not to notice. The younger
generation seems to be all about fashion but the older generation does not seem
to care about appearance and many have lost their teeth. They speak so fast and so differently! Brazilian
Portuguese sounds clear and kind of like Spanish where Portugal Portuguese
sounds like French and Italian and people look to be in an argument but that is
just how they talk! They also have little cars and they will park ANYWHERE,
even the sidewalk or middle of the street!
One thing I notice
about this mission is that all of the missionaries have so much energy and
fun!! But the part I LOVE is that this mission prides itself on being an OBEDIENT
mission! For example, you cannot speak English at all, even in your house! It
has been really hard to adapt to no English especially when I love to talk. I
feel inadequate at times when I want to express my feeling to help someone out
and cant because I don’t know how....Please pray for me this week to get better
at the language.
Our area Miratejo is
big! It has a couple of cities in it and it’s just us and two other
missionaries working here. We got to the apartment and there was a note saying,
“No investigators right now... go to work.”
So that’s what we did! We contact people in 2 ways, first in the street
where everyone says..."eu sou catholica" or "Nao tempo eu tenho
trabalhar". The next way we talk to people is in the apartment buildings but
the challenge is to get someone inside the building to unlock the door--we need
just one person to let us in. Usually
people say no, but my smart comp says, "I forgot my keys can you unlock it
for us?" When they do, we head up
to the top of the building and then work our way down knocking on every door with
most telling us to go away.
We have been here for
5 days and only taught one lesson, I can see how missionaries get discouraged
with the lack of progress. One day I was telling my comp this and he told me to
just keep smiling and have a good attitude and miracles will happen. Twenty
minutes later someone said they would like to meet back for an appointment! It was
crazy!! Then when we schedule an appointment, prepare and walk for like 20
minutes to the apartment and they don’t even answer, it’s so frustrating! I
just got to keep faith and have patience. So right now we don’t have any new investigators.
Something I love about
Miratejo is the members here are amazing--like 60 or 70 STRONG ACTIVE members! This
Sunday I had to bear my testimony in Portuguese and it was so hard but I
survived and made everyone laugh by saying from the pulpit, "I know I am
not good at Portuguese." I truly do
love the members and they have increased my faith so much by watching their
sacrifices like just coming to church. I think of my home where I could walk to
my church building. The church here is really cool, it is between 2 big apartment
buildings and has 3 stories. The members feed us Sunday lunch and dinner and
wow....I never want to come back because the food here is so great!! I love the
bakery where they have, “pastel de nata”.
I know they will have those in
heaven! haha
Some funny things this
week were 1)my comp pulling me away in the nick of time to save me when I
stepped in front of an oncoming train, and 2)throwing up because I have a weird cough which doesn’t
hurt and then looking at my comp and bursting into laughter.
This is hard and frustrating
work but man I love it here and love the people of Portugal. My address for
mail is:
Elder Chase Herrmann
Rua Jorge Barradas
No.14 C
1400-05
sboa
Fica Bem! Tchau!
- Elder Herrmann
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| Picture in front of chapel with Elder Souza |
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| A castle in Lisboa |
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| Veiw of Lisbon outside missionary window |
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| How people park |
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| Walking in and thought dad would like it |
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| Study Area |
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| Walk through a field to get to the mall! |
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| With everett in MTC before I left |
