Letter from Sam - Week 11

Hey Dad!

I’m glad that you had so much fun on your trip! Yeah I remember us going on the hike with the natural amphitheatre. I remember it very well. I even remember crossing the same river many times and what the area looked like. That was a lot of fun. We have gone on a lot of amazing hikes. When I get back we’ll have to go on a lot more. That stinks that you had to work until 9:00pm when you got back. How are things going with work anyways?

This week has been pretty intense. My companion is very awesome. He knows a lot about the gospel and he’s a very hard worker. He does have some weird eating habits though. For instance he won’t drink anything until after he has eaten all his food. And today for lunch he made spaghetti and I’m not exaggerating when I say he put about a 1/4 cup of salt in the sauce. I about died. I waited till he went into another room and then discretely hid it in the trash can. He also put pine needles in the sauce. That surprisingly tasted pretty good but the salt was just too much. Everyone here loves salt like its sugar.

I’ve taught the first lesson a lot. I teach it at least 3 times a day. My Portuguese is getting a little better. At first when I got here I couldn’t understand hardly anything. I’ve been used to the São Paulo accent for so long that it took a while to pick up on the words I know from the Santa Maria accent. They talk a lot faster here. Well I can bring my camera now when I email so I can send you some pictures but I don’t know if I will be able to today or not. I’ll try but the computer is really slow right now. There’s a lot of people here using other computers on the same server. These kids here are playing counter-strike- the same game I play at home. They are amazing at it. I watched someone play while I was waiting to get on the computer.

Well have a great day at work and I hope to be able to get some pictures off to ya. Talk to you next week! I love you!!!

Elder Fowler

Hey Mom!

I’m glad you had a good time at the woman’s conference. It’s good to hear that things at home are good. I don’t have a lot of time on this computer so I’ll have to be fast. My companion is awesome. He is so smart in the gospel and has such a strong testimony. I’ve been able to pick up more on the Santa Maria accent these last few days. On average we teach 4 families a day or so. We have a lot of potential investigators or people that said we could talk to them but a lot of them aren’t home when we get there or some decide that they don’t want us to talk to them. The city is small but really big when we have to walk from one end to the other. It takes us about 30 minutes of walking to get from house to house so it stinks when they aren’t there. My feet hurt really bad at first but now I’m used to the pain. The food here is really good. When we go to member’s houses they feed us sooo much. One thing that’s been hard to get used to is no dinner. Here in Brazil they don’t really have a dinner so we have to eat a big enough lunch at 12:00 to get us through the day.

Oh next week I’ll probably be emailing you guys in the morning so you might not be able to send me anything in time on Wednesday morning.

Well I don’t have a closet but my apartment is pretty nice. My bed is comfortable and I have no complaints. I’m out of time so I’ll have to leave. Thanks for telling me about the talk Bishop Burton gave. Thanks for everything mom. I LOVE YOU INFINITY!!!
Elder Fowler


P.S. Just something funny- I show the investigators and members the pictures I have of our family and my friends. Every time a member sees a picture of Grandpa Fowler they ask if it’s President Hinckley. And when they see the picture of Grandma Shaw they can’t believe how young she is. It’s funny to hear that. You’ll have to tell Grandma Fowler and Grandma and Grandpa Shaw that.

P.P.S. Oh and tell Thomas that right now on the computer next to me I can see someone playing World of Warcraft. That game is all over the world.