One Month Out!

Well hey there family!How is everything going? I hope all is well, and it sounds like you are having fun up there! My week has been pretty good! This Saturday we get to teach investigators so I’m pretty excited, I’m way scared though I don’t know if i can speak good enough but all of the instructors say this is when the gift of tongues really come out cause we will say things we don’t know! And then next week we get to go tracting!!!! Ah wow pretty crazy! The language is coming much better! The lord is definitely helping me through this time in my life! That is about all the excitement in my life!So just a little bit about my amazing instructor; he heard about the church when he was 15, is parents forbid him to learn any more and that he was not to be baptized, however he would go to the temple every week to be taught and on his 18th birthday he was baptized. He severed a mission when he was 19 in Brazil. His family is still not active but will accept him! That is pretty much the way it is down hear for all the Brazilians. but this is not the end of his story he works full time goes to school full time, and lives 2 hours away from the ctm he gets a total of 4 hours of sleep a night, and that is if he can sleep. He has a ton of ulcers all over his stomach and can not lie down so he stands up. And all this time he has not complained once, in fact all he says is that the lord just keeps blessing him in so many different ways! He is an amazing guy. Brother Siva is his name.Anyway I love you all!

-Elder Engh

Week 3

Hey there family! How is every thing going at home! Thank you for sending all the letters, still haven’t got any though. I’m sure they will be here soon! Anyway things are great here. Still leaning the language and sitting in class all day! But I’m learning! Its a lot of fun to translate sentences cause every thing is so backwards! My week has been great but I will share my most favorite moment! On Tuesday we have a devotional, and this week we had a broadcast from Provo that Elder Scott talked at; and wow it was so amazing I loved it so much! At the beginning of the talk he blessed all of us with the gift of tongues! Wow that was totally needed! Then he talked about following the guidance of the sprit and it was way cool, he asked the question, if we knew when to know if it was the sprit or if it was our own thoughts, then said it doesn’t matter! As long as we are keeping the commandments we will receive thoughts in to our head! I didn’t even know that I was totally blown away! And then at the end of the talk the blessed all the missionaries with a blanked of protection that the devils will pass us bye and we will complete a mission in safety against all things! And for the huge thing of the whole meeting was when he bore his testimony! It was a testimony that really makes you wonder if he has seen Jesus Christ! He said that if we don’t remember anything from this meeting to remember that he knows! He knows that Christ lives that he put the plan of salvation in to action and that we will return to our father in heaven! Wow how powerful! It was way good!
I realized that I really haven’t explained how cool my P day is! We as missionaries actually get to go out in to Brazil and interact with the people! We go on the streets and do what we need to do! Its way cool we have to speak in as much Portuguese as possible! I love it! It gets pretty funny at times but its way cool!Any way I need to run but I love you all, thank you so much for everything!
-Elder Engh

Bugs and Hair, What a Pair!

Ok family we have a problem here in Brazil! I receive the second to least amount of mail! I thought I would get embarrassed with how much mail I get but on the contrary I have received 3 letters two from mom and one from Jen let’s work on this people. :) I say that with all my love in my heart!Well my week has been awesome! Its gone by so dang fast I really don’t know what happened through all of it! A missionary told us that the days seem like weeks and the weeks seam like days! So true! I cant even believe how fast two weeks has gone! So the ctm stands forcentro de treinamento missionario. Translated in to the central missionary training center! The language is definitely coming! I was able to teach a short lesson 3-5 min about the restoration in portages! So its going much better! Thank you so much for your prayers! Now I just need to learn how to communicate other then gospel subjects! Let me tell you a little about what its like in the ctm, when I take a shower I take it with a thousand bugs joining me. I have to make sure I shake my garments out or else I end up with them joining me for the day, they don’t bite, they are really friendly! When we eat we have to pick out hairs and other weird things that I really don’t want to know what they are. The people who work here cleaning and cooking usually are not members but are so nice! The teachers are all brazilin and have learned ingles from there mission compainaros. They are mostly converts to the church and have testimonies that you would not believe. The average family around here lives off 1000 rehi or about 500 us dollars a month. If you wonder why we clap instead of nock on the doors its cause there is 12 ft tall fences in front of their house so you clap and then they let you in. I love it here, even the parts that don’t seem good I love! The bugs keep me company and the hair gives me some thing to look forward to at the meals. We eat a ton of rice and beans and frankly, I love them they just get kinda old but I keep eating them and putting on the weight I have gained 6 kilos down hear, you do the math! Conference was amazing! We watched every thing at the same time you did except for priesthood it started at 10 pm our time so it would have been midnight before it ended so we watched it Sunday morning! I got so much more out of it when you have to be in a suite taking notes! It was great! My favorite talk was Elder Holland’s! What a powerful testimony! We loved it here at the ctm! But there were so many good talks!I found out some more things about my mission that you might be interested in. my mission president only speaks Portuguese. It’s the highest baptizing mission in the church when I come home I should have baptized any where from 200-300 ´pessoas. They have rats there that are the size of cats and the people eat them for meals! Its one of the more poor parts of Brazil, the new temple that was announced is in the south I will be in the north. It gets hot and humid but it gets really windy! I’m so excited to go! I cant wait until I’m out in the field teaching the gospel!Guys I want you to know that I love this gospel it has indeed been restored to this earth by a prophet of god! Pai Celestial loves us and wants out happiness! The book of Mormon is the word of god!I love you all so much! Have a great week! Remember lets write Elder Engh letters! Also as much as I love e mail I don’t have a lot of time on the computers though so try to keep your email shorter and your letters longer!Love ya
Elder David Engh

The First Email

Hey guys how is every thing going? How has your week been? My week has flown by! I can’t even believe how fast it’s gone! Thank you so much for your letters of encouragement! I am still finding them!
Well as you might have noticed I have made it down to Brazil! I love it here! The plane ride was really long I spent about 16 hrs on a plane so by the time we arrived in Brazil I was very happy! Brazil is amazing it’s so pretty it’s nothing like I expected! So far the people seem to be way nice! The ctm is amazing I love it hear it so beautiful to have the sprit with me at all times! The food is amazing we are eating actually Brazilian food so its lots of beans and rice and meat! The meat is really good and I have grown to love rice and beans seriously! I have already put on three pounds! It’s so delicious! The weather here is nothing like what I expected! It is a pattern of hot, cold and rain! One day it gets so hot and humid that it will rain the next day and that night it gets cold then it gets hot and humid again! That is all I have seen!
Class is long we spend about 8-9 hours in the class learning about pourtagues and the gospel its good but kinda frustrating! The language is really hard! The sounds are weird! But the language is really pretty once you get good! To day we got to go to the temple in sao paulo! It was very nice to go to the temple! It was just what I needed! The temple is so beautiful I love it! I got my first injury hear! I cut my head open on a closet lock! It hurt but I didn’t have to get stitches so don’t worry it’s just my monumental experience hear at the ctm! My companion is supper cool elder smedley! He is from Idaho! I like him a lot!
Dad I have no idea what ctm stands for it just what we call it, you could probably look it up. Thank you so much for your emails from now on I cant check my aol so just send emails to me hear! I was wrong about packages you can send them to me just make sure to do it through the US mail! (Post office) and when you send me letters put the return address on the back otherwise they get confused where to send it! Mom I got your letter on Friday.
Guy’s thank you so much for all of your encouragement! I love you guys so much! I love you all very much you mean the world to me! I am having a wonderful time and I know I’m out here for a reason! Pray for me that I might learn the language!
Love Elder Engh