Sam's Letter - Week 12

Hey Mom!

Well the bad news is that I wasn’t able to go to conference. There was a bus that was going to take the ward here in Palmeira to Cruz Alta to our stake center to watch it but my mission president told us to work. I don’t really understand the specifics cause I couldn’t really understand when my companion was trying to explain it. I can’t wait till I can read it though in the Ensign (the Liahona here in Brazil)

Yesterday was a really bad day. I was really sick (the first time in a while). I had a mixture between the flu and the fever. I lay in bed all day and when it was night time my body ached all over and it was impossible to find a comfortable spot. I threw up in the night and after that I started to feel a little bit better. Right now my joints hurt but my fever has gone down.

This week we saw a drunk guy driving in the road. He stopped in the middle of the road and then went in reverse and hit the curb and popped his tire. We went and got his address to go teach him. It was pretty funny.

That stinks that Jim’s truck is totaled. I’m glad he’s ok though.

I’m glad that Corey’s back. He’s so fun to be around. You guys will have lots of fun on holidays. I can’t believe that LOST is already on. I bet you guys are so excited.

I’m getting a little more acquainted with the language. It’s still hard to understand cause people talk so fast. It’s coming along though. I’ve been reading the Book of Mormon every morning and Jesus The Christ and I’ve learned so much. I love studying in the morning. We have 3 people with baptismal dates. One of them is a lady that I don’t know how committed to the church she is but we’ll see. The other two we met a week ago and gave them the first lesson and they are reading and praying and coming along great. Well this week I was going to send some pictures again but it’s so hard. I have to email my mission president and go on two other sites for the mission. Each p-day I’ll keep trying though. Well I’ve got to go. I really love being on a mission and I’ve learned and grown so much. I’ll talk to you next week! I love you infinity!!!!

Elder Fowler

Excerpts from Sam’s letter to Matt

“One of the things I want to gain out of my mission is the ability to work hard even when I don’t want to. Before my mission if I didn’t want to do something I would procrastinate it until either I wanted to do it or had to do it. These past 2 weeks have been hard to make that transfer but I’m getting a lot better at it. I just think about all the advice that I’ve been given and just keep walking and working.”

“So far I haven’t felt homesick for long periods of time. I’ve been doing a lot better than I thought with it. Portuguese has been a little frustrating though. It’s still really hard to understand when people talk about everyday things. When people talk about gospel I can understand, but anything else I can only understand a little. I guess its cause at the CTM I’m only taught stuff about the gospel.”

“This city that I’m in is really nice. Every night I feel like I’m at the cabin. I can see tons of stars and some of the dirt roads are just like the cabin.”