Hello everyone,

  I want to start out this letter by thanking Josh for his email, you never change and that is why I love you. You have a pretty good grip on my sense of thought and everything you said was good to hear, and you need to be married to get into the Celestial Kingdom, even if it is against your will.
     Things are picking up here. There is one woman that I can never understand. I have said this before, but questions in Portuguese are really hard to notice. This woman, Faniana, will look at me... talk a whole bunch... then stop out of nowhere and stare at me. After she leans her head forward a little more and squints her eyes I realize she is asking a question and I smile and say something about Heavenly Father and prayer and she will say amen a few times and everything will be good. Other people are easier to understand, but I really struggle with her.
       While I was on a ´´division`` with another Elder we taught a man named named Sergio. He argued and argued that the people in our church weren't´t perfect and therefore the church wasn't´t true and all churches weren't´t true, just closer than others. I told him that all of his doubts and questions could be answered by prayer about the The Book of Mormon. He was difficult to teach, but he had a giant painting of Freddie Mercury on the wall and I liked that.
      We baptized Fabiana this past Sunday and we had two investigators at the Baptism. Clefferson and his mom, Cida. They are a great family and we taught her other son and he is reading the Book of Mormon and liking it. I am going to make them pizza, ``Papa John´s`` style so I need mom´s recipe for sauce and a recipe for a toss-able dough. During a lesson to them Clefferson gave the opening prayer and the only thing he thanked Heavenly Father for was the Book of Mormon and the help it gives his family. He is thirteen and an awesome kid.
     Also during my division we met a woman named Aminha. She cried during our lesson and during the first vision . When we finished she told us that she had a dream that we would come. It was crazy. She was a really sweet old woman and she could barely see so they are going to give a Book of Mormon during the next lesson.
     I feel great. I´ve seen two cockroaches in our house and I usually wake up with bugs crawling on me. I wash my clothes by hand and It takes a long time so you can make some assumptions about the state of my white shirts. Even though this is such a different lifestyle than anything I have ever lived it feels like it is the only life I know.
    I´m sure everyone is wondering about the food and since I am the pickiest person you all probably think that I am struggling, well you are wrong. They mostly have rice an beans. With these two they will trow in something random like meat, pasta, or more likely something colorful that I am not familiar with. I am usually so hungry that I don´t even look at the food, I just eat it. And I it always leaves me satisfied. Just as always I eat the fastest and Elder Freitas eats really slow so I always sit there until the woman who cooked the food looks at me and says ``eat more.`` If I say that I am full all of the women immediately say that I don´t like their food, so basically I always leave with a stomach ache. Now everyone reading this is saying ``Stephen, you should just eat slower.`` Well, that is logical but old habits die hard and I just love eating fast and I always will.
      I am a missionary and I am in Brazil, but I am still me and it is hard because I want to be the me that I am to my investigators, but the only me they know is the quiet American who eats fast. I am talking more and I have been very blessed, but I feel like part of me is dying. The fun, real me, because I can´t be him with my current understanding of the language.
    I love the work, It is way better than yard work, and Casey thank you for the letter in MTC I never said thank you. Also thanks for letting me live at your house.
    I love you all, but Noodle is always number 1!

Com Amor,
     Elder Nothum