Nicole takes BRAZIL

Awkward, almost kiss... again. SO, in Brazil, you greet people with a hug and a kiss on the cheek... I feel like I kiss more people in a day than most people do in their whole life haha anyways, as  sister missionaries, we are not allowed to greet those of the opposite gender like that so we usually just stick with a handshake. The other day we were teaching this man, L and at the end he grabs my hand and tries to pull me up off the couch and kiss me! When I realized what he was doing I was like "nao nao! somos missionarias!" and we had to explain things to him and he was really embarrassed, it was so awk... but sister D said that happens all the time.

21st Birthday! As some of you might know... I celebrated my 21 run in Brazil this week. We had a district/zone meeting in the morning and after that was done, Elder I (ZL) was like everyone go to the kitchen for a birthday surpise! Turns out my whole zone had brought some sort of sweet with them and they all sang me happy birthday in portuguese first and then english. it was so sweet! THEN, to top it all off, the ZLs presented me with "a taste of america for your bday" A HERSHEYS CANDY BAR. Oh man they're the best. And then I had my first Brazilian Pizza for dinner with my comp... IT WAS SO GOOD. Thankfully there is a pizzaria right across the street from our house. :) Other than that it was a pretty miserable day haha it poured rain all day and was COLD, we visited a lot of people too, so I felt like a real missionary all soaking wet in the cold. haha

3 Month Anniversary! This week I also celebrated my 3 month anniversary on the mission WOOHOO. On the 24th  our phone stopped working and President A called us 15 times and the ZL/DL couldn't get ahold of us as we
ll so they were all really worried. We were practically rogue missionaries haha anyways, they ended up calling our members home and we had to go all the way to San Bernardo to get a new phone from the office elders, which costs about R$20 to get there on the train. laammeee

Winter. Woof. Turns out, Sao Paulo has a winter time. And let me tell you, it stinks. Why did no one tell me this? It has been 7 degC and raining and windy all week!

Teaching. we are teaching a lot of people. J V is one of our new investigators and he is great. He knows the church is true and comes to church every Sunday. He is definitely elect, we just have to get over some law of chastity and word of wisdom issues first. We are teaching a lot of other people as well, but no one that is progressing immensely :( But all in good time. We are working with a recent convert less active T who is so great. She is married to a cocaine addict with a daughter so she is going through some really hard times, but we visit her a lot and I can see her faith in Christ growing everyday.

The Lingua: Portuguese is still really hard, but I know a lot more than I did last week... I just have to get rid of my American accent haha and maybe people will understand me.

Well I hope you all have a great week!

Jacob 4:1-3, Don't forget to read your sciptures every day... they were written for YOU.

Love,

Sister Hargrove