Literally in Paradise!

Bem-Vindas, Porto Velho! 

Yes it's true, I'm literally in paradise! This area is seriously so beautiful! I'm surrounded by water and boats, parks and old buildings! Statues and gardens!

My new companion is Sister Agurto! She is from Chile and lives in Santiago which is super close to where

Dallin will be serving! How cool!  She is 23. She has 8 months in the field which means in one month we get to head north (sleep for a whole day! yay!) and renew her visa. She has a super thick accent which was a little difficult at first but we understand each other now!  

This week we spent several hours wandering the streets, exploring, more or less (ok fine, let's be honest, we spent many hours completely turned around just trying to find our apartment! ha ha!) 

The last sisters here didn't leave hardly anything. We had a list of pesquisadores but slowly we soon realized that most of the addresses were wrong or didn't exist... and some of them just say, third garage after the souvenir shop next to that one thing by that other thing..

So my plea for every missionary and future missionary: Please write in your Area Book!! haha!

But seriously.

Thankfully one address was almost correct. And after talking to our Sister Leaders and finding out the house we were looking for is in the opposite corner from an African Temple with a giant crown on top, we finally found a pesquisadora! 

Angelita! We talked with her for almost an hour about the other lessons she'd received and about her family, her expectations and hopes for her daughter, Alicia(3), etc. She is truly amazing. She is two years away from finishing a major in education in order to be a teacher. 

This sunday she visited the Stake Conference and had a wonderful time! She had a baptism date marked but it turns out she isn't actually married...so guess what? We're going to talk to her husband this week (hopefully start teaching him, because he's already open to our visits) and mark not only a baptism for Angelita but a wedding date! Yay!  

Please pray for her and her husband. I really want to teach them as a whole family, but for now we are just getting to know them.

So far I'm loving this area! The only thing that could make it better...a new bed! haha! Our Sister Leaders LTS (Sister Brito and Sister Quintiliano) stayed at our house last night because they needed to head for Porto Alegre early this morning and the area where they are serving is actually a boat ride away! Anyways, we knew that that our beds were broken and had already talked to the Elders about getting someone to fix them or replace them...but I dont think we realized just how broken...

Under my bed had been the other two mattress for the LTS. I knew that more or less these mattresss were holding up my mattress in one spot and I'd even put a pillow under my mattress to fill a part that was super dipped...Well, we removed the mattresses and....Crash! One half of my bed fell on the ground... 

We're praying for a replacement soon haha! 

Anyways, I love you all and I'm so happy to hear about your adventures! 

Oh and guess what? I have only one year left??? How crazy is that!

All my love,

Sister Hemmert