November 8, 2011

Dear Family,

Well, I am writing on Tuesday because I had to go to Rio yesterday for a training. I was called to be a trainer again, and with the new program for trainers that the church is doing (which no doubt Marissa knows) I will train for twelve weeks and my goal is to prepare this new missionary to be able to train another at the end of the 12 weeks. Exciting. There are 11 trainers and 11 that will arrive...a few americans, a few brazilians, and one that speaks spanish. We will meet them in two and a half hours from now. More details to come next week.

This final week with Elder Branco was excellent. We work very well together. Of course we are very different, but our different styles compliment each other. Where I lack, he's there to help. I told President in interviews that I had never done 140 contacts in one week (which is always the goal). He challenged me to start now. We took the challenge and literally talked with everyone. We managed 168!! That's a record. We found so many new people to teach!!  The ward is loving us two. They don't want us to leave. Elder Branco bore his testimony on sunday and happened to say that he might leave this week. Everyone started to cry. I usually don't tell people when the transfers are, but he made sure everyone knew. So, as you can imagine, lots of tears and exchange of address.

More exciting news. I was talking about Maykon and Eleziene. We baptized maykon a few months ago and baptized Eleziene (his friend) a few weeks ago. Now they are officially dating!! So, in a roundabout way, I baptized a family! (If they get married)

Adriano. He didn't go to church because he went to a soccer game in Rio that he had already paid for. We let him go this tie, but i am 90 percent sure that we will get him next week. He was destined to be baptized. After him, we'll get the rest of his family.

Love you all. Don't have as much time today.

Com amor,
Elder Walker