THE CAT IS... in the bag?

Mom Note* Noah has transfers today!
And tomorrow is his birthday! The Bishop's Family (of his current area) gave him this little car. It's sweet because Noah's favorite color as a kid was purple....which just so happened to be my favorite color. What can I say? The boy loves his Mombo!

Generally, this is something that would go into my "RANDOM STUFF" section, but this is far too wack to put down there - Elder Vitti and I were making our usual stroll home from a long day of walking and talking to people. It was fairly late, around like 8:30ish or so. We are heading up a pretty big hill making our way toward the house, when Elder Vitti needed to stop to catch his breath (he does this many times by the way haha). As we were standing there taking a second to relax, a guy walks by us, kind of in a rush. After he passed I realize he had a pretty big blue plastic bag in his hands. What was in the bag? A freaking dead cat... WHAT AND WHY? I've learned it's really no use to ask these questions while living here. I'm 90% sure Manaus is not a real place. Anyway, after the scary dead cat bag guy got a little ways ahead of us, he veered off to the left and tossed the cat into a big pile of trash that was on the side of the road. (side note: there's about a million of these trash piles, in fact, with all due respect, the whole city is a trash pile) (please do not let a Manaus local have access to my email).

MMHMM WASSSSGUUUUDDDDDD YOOO?

HOW WE DOING? HOW WE FEELIN? HOW WAS THE PAST WEEK? WHAT'S YOUR CREDIT CARD INFORMATION?

This week was fairly solid. The usual unreal and insane stuff. I'll try and keep it short. But I'm a yapper so enjoy this BS

A couple weeks ago, Elder Vitti and I helped this guy that's in a wheelchair set up his Christmas Tree. That was quite the adventure. Afterward he made us egg sandwiches (they always make egg sandwiches bro) (and I literally have eggs everyday for breakfast) and we chatted for a while. He asked what I did before the mission and I told him about how I worked on cabinets for some church buildings in Hawaii. He was interested. Guess who had a desk that needed to be built? This guy. A great service opportunity. So this week Elder Vitti and I went over to his house to help him build it. A few things you need to know about this guys house: He has this nasty old raggedy dog. I'm pretty sure this thing has survived two world wars, has been run over multiple times, has been caught on fire and probably has like 75% of the world's known diseases. He's so gross looking. Like a fat zombie Scooby Doo or something (poor little guy). IT SMELLS LIKE PISS AND DYING DOG IN THIS HOUSE. It's so bad. My eyes legitimately tear up and sting when I'm in there. I hate it so much. It makes me want to break down and cry. MY MAN HOW ARE YOU LIVING LIKE THIS? There's no way he is nose blind to that, right? He must be. Okay, to continue the story, we drag this dusty, busted desk out of the corner of this guy's living room and It's missing hardware. Great. We take this guy in his wheelchair to the hardware store and pick up some brackets and screws, and head back. It's hotter than a the mother freaking depths of hell and we are outside in our normal church clothes working on this desk. I'm dying and about to start crying, but we have to get it done. I'm underneath the desk trying to get a bracket mounted for the top of the desk when my best friend- zombie dog, decides he's going to sit right next to me as I'm struggling to get this thing put together. BRO WHY? The stench. I can still smell it. I will never forget. By the end of all of this we are filthy and in our church clothes, but finally we have this desk done (thank freaking goodness) and we demolished some egg sandwiches and guarana. (my sandwich had two egg shells in it)(if you didn't know: I love egg shells) - PHOTO OF US AND THE DESK DOWN BELOW. SOME MIGHT SAY I AM MASTER CARPENTER.

On Saturday we stopped by Guilheremes house to visit and invite him to church. It went super well and he said he'd be there and he was. It was super cool because I was the one who asked him if he wanted to go. I sat next to him during sacrament and everything was going really well until the very end of the meeting. I'm relaxing and trying to listen closely to the speaker when all of a sudden I hear the door behind me open and close. Guess who was there? MUTHA FREAKIN ELDER RANDALLS SNAKE! The dang crazy lady was right behind me. She started yelling some crazy nonsense at me, waving her hands around and pretending to have a sword- slashing it in my face. I have no idea what it was about, but all I knew is that this lady is psychotic and causing a distraction. I immediately stood up and motioned her toward the door. We make it outside the meeting room and I'm wondering if this would be the last time I would be seen alive. She continues to blab about who knows what, when she grabs my hand with both of hers. HECK NAH YOU FREAK. SNAKE BE GONE! I pulled my hands away really fast and just then Elder Vitti comes bursting through the door to save the day (he helps with the music at the front of the congregation so that's why it took so long for him to help me). She starts talking to Elder Vitti about who knows what, and finally we shake her hand and send her off on her way. Afterward I asked Elder Vitti what she was saying and he said he had no clue either. LOL. After all the meetings, I talked with Elder Randal and Elder Bendall. Elder Bendall told me that as they were having a baptism for a lady they had been teaching, the crazy snake lady was watching them and banging on the window of the room that the baptism was being held in. Elder Bendall told me that he said a little prayer just before they were supposed to start and just after he did, she wondered off somewhere else. Where did she go? To yell and bother me. I'm glad my terror and fear was the answer to someone else's prayer.

RANDOM STUFF:

1.We had lunch at this woman's house that's interested in the church. Some good lasagna. She gave us some to take home and some random guy in front of a store asked if he could have it so we gave it to him. I'm glad we ran into him. I think he really needed that lasagna.

2. We were entering some members' backyard through the side and I was closing the gate and I turned around real fast. Air conditioning units have big concrete blocks with holes so people can't steal them. I smacked my head on the side of one of those. I thought I was going down.

3. We pulled up to a random members house and they for some reason had a super expensive karaoke setup. Elder Vitti did karaoke for us.

4. We went to the Amazon Rainforest for a zone-wide P-day, it was pretty sick. I'm going to send a second email with pictures from that.

5. There's a lot of girls here with the name Elizabeth. What's Elizabeths shortened name? Not Beth but... BETCH. LOL. They say stuff so funny.

6. I almost got hit by a car. He WAS about 6 inches from slamming into me at about 45mph. Shorty after a guy on a bike was just as close to me with his phone out making a "OI ELDER" video. Apparently it's a meme here. Lots of people that have no idea who we really are yell that at us. It's kinda cool. OI ELDER.

7. This drunk guy stopped Elder Vitti and I on the side of the road and talked to us for a while. We invited him to church (he definitely doesn't remember) and he invited us to his farm to eat armored fish! An interesting exchange.

8. Some members at lunch showed us how California was on fire. Shortly after it got really dark and started pouring harder than I had ever seen before. I thought it was the end I'm not even going to lie.

9. My birthday is this coming week and so are transfers, so we went ahead and had carrot cake. (I made the cake and to be honest it was kinda awful. I guess desserts aren't my specialty.) PHOTO DOWN BELOW.

10. I got 5 new soccer jerseys.

11. I'm losing my mind.

12. Elder Mendoza went straight to the Mission President and asked if he could be my companion HAHA. Unfortunately President said no.

SCRIPTURE OF THE WEEK: John 6:49

“Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead.”

Just kidding it's not that one. It's: John 11:25-26

25 "Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:"

26 "And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?"

BELIEVE AND HAVE EVERLASTING LIFE YOOOO

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

“Hey bro, Elder Randall you are my slut.” - Elder Vitti, (I didn't teach him this, Elder Vitti needs to be stopped)

"You no need uma gata you need Christ." - Elder Vitti, to me. (We won't go into detail for this one...)

Well guys. I think that's it this week. I hope things are going smoothly for y'all. I hope all of your wildest dreams come true. Vote for Pedro. Send me emails. To those who have: sorry I'm taking forever. It's kind of a pain in the booty to write so many so I'll try and be better. I LOVE YOU ALL. KEEP BEING AWESOME. REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE. READ YA SCRIPTURES AND PRAY. Until next week gang. PEACE <3

IM SENDING A SECOND EMAIL WITH AMAZON RAINFOREST PHOTOS

PHOTOS POSSIBLY IN ORDER THIS TIME:

1. Baby Turtle.