Here is the latest from Sarah! This could be her last letter from Braga - I will let you know as soon as I hear from her or her dad of an address change. I should get an email from her tomorrow or Tuesday and I'll post her group one ASAP too! :) She is really gettin' to work out there, so make sure you are keeping her in your prayers!
- Ridiculouslygoodlooking
"April 14, 2009
Hey Hey
So sorry for the delay of the letter this week. Since I don´t have a whole lot of time today, it is just going to be one big letter. Turns out that the Catholics feel ripped off that they don´t get Easter off since it is already a weekend, so they just stay closed for another day after. Not to mention pretty much everything was shut down for Semana Santa here in Braga. This week was interesting...pretty much all of Portugal comes to Braga for Easter because it is the home of the Catholics here in Portugal. They also had all sorts of crazy parades every night, people walking around carrying crosses, wearing thorny crowns, black masks and noise makers to look like the angel of death and all sorts of crazy things. They also have all of the streets in the center wired with speakers and were playing crazy death music interspersed with Ave Maria and Pai Nosso. It was definitely an interesting experience of which I didn´t understand a lot of, but that's okay. There were also a bunch of groups going door to door scattering flowers and talking to people so our knocking was a little different this week. We actually decided to be clever and rolled up copies of the Living Christ, tied them with ribbons, and knocked doors telling people we had an Easter present. The Elders thought we were nuts, but it was actually more effective than usual. I don´t know if that was because we were a bit outside of the city in a really poor area, or if it is because we told people we had a present for them. Everyone likes presents right??
As for transfers, we will know for sure on Saturday, but I am pretty sure this is my last full week here in Braga. I think I am really going to miss it, but I would rather leave because I know if I stay here, I will be training. There is actually a good chance that I will be training anyway, but I´m hopeful that I don´t have to do that yet. This transfer is going to be crazy because we are getting 16 new missionaries, so it is definitely going to be a party in Porto next week. 4 new sisters and all are American. That is why I will probably train because there are only 4 of us that know enough of both languages to get around, and one of them is already training. I guess that is what happens when the majority are Brazilian and don´t speak a bit of English. I don´t feel that I speak well enough to train yet, but we will see what the Lord´s take is on that. (as for the accent mom, unfortunately my companion has corrupted my carefully cultivated European accent and now people in the street actually ask me if I am from Brazil) For sure Irmã Polito and I are being separated. As a result we have decided to make this the best week of our companionship and one-up our own records that we have set here. We have a goal of 40 lessons this week, so we will see how it goes. We are usually around 18-22 but we set a record with 39 one week. Prayers would be appreciated!
Speaking off- my 6 month mark is tomorrow!!!! Crazy weird how fast time flies. I can hardly believe it. I was just thinking as we packed our bags this morning how my life is so completely different right now that I ever would have expected it to be a year ago. It was so totally natural to count out the number of pamphlets and pass along cards that I have a set as a goal today, the Tabernacle choir playing as we got ready and I don´t think I am comfortable walking without the Book of Mormon in my hand now. It is amazing how it has become second nature to talk to people in the streets in a language that I hardly know. We are truly blessed with the companionship of the spirit in our work, because there is NO WAY I could do any of this without it. I am so completely unqualified to be the representative of something so marvelous, it is actually kinda scary to think about sometimes. I truly am thankful for the knowledge we have and the power that comes with the covenants that we keep.
As for the heat in April, we know how you feel. Cold and Wet has returned with a vengeance, and we had a very rainy week and Easter. Bummer, but the good news is I managed to buy a new umbrella before it got bad. The really good new is that it is pink with white polkadots, so at least we have something to help lift our spirits. The Elders like to make fun of it, but they sure were grateful to share when we all got caught in the rain yesterday! I am learning every day more the power of prayer. Love you all and thank you so much for your support.
Irmã Ray"
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Monday, April 13, 2009
Sarah's General Conference Expereince!
First - Happy Easter!!!
Second - I am so horrible! I got this letter a week ago and it has still taken me FOREVER to post it... I'm not sure how many people actually read her letters via blog anyway, but still! This is for her to have all her emails on record as well... done and done. Enjoy!!!
- Ridiculouslygoodlooking
P.S. There is a picture attached below that relates to the letter - enjoy that as well!
April 6, 2009
"Hey Hey!
Hope that everyone had a marvelous and wonderful conference weekend. Ours was definitely eventful. It started off with service at painting the school again. We had a great opportunity to play with some of the kids afterwards. I am ashamed to admit that we missionaries were completely thrashed in soccer by a small group of elementary to middle school special education children. Very embarrassing, but it was a lot of fun. They were great.
Next, divisions with the sisters from Guimarães. I drew the short straw and therefore got to forgo the set appointment and had the opportunity to knock doors de novo. It was good because I have been wanting to knock an area for a long time, but since my companion isn´t really big on the whole finding new people thing, we haven´t done it yet. HOWEVER, Irmã Solles is a rock star and so we decided to take on the hill (a certain area by our house). We were feeling really good about ourselves until it became apparent by looking through the windows that the first house we knocked had no one living there. Not to be deterred, we continued on and to our surprise we were invited in at the next house. Little to our knowledge it ended up being 3 very old Jehovah´s Witness die hards. After about 30 minutes we managed to escape with our bibles (he almost kept one) and a small part of our sanity. Don´t worry, all of you were included as well as he pretty much cursed anyone we had ever talked to. The funny thing was the next house we knocked the man asked us if we were JW and when we said no he said good, what is your message...I don´t like them. At that point neither did we. I have to admit I had the very un-Christlike urge at one point to kick the stool out from underneath the poor guy. HOWEVER, I did not, and we all escaped on friendly terms...more or less.
To go back in time just a bit...April Fools Day is also a Portuguese holiday, but the whole idea of pranks is totally lost to them. Unfortunately we tried to use a member as our in to get the Elders, so the whole thing went up in smoke as she TOTALLY gave everything away. It was a bit of a bummer as I was so kindly surprised with a special treat in my food after district meeting...see attached picture.The sad thing is I have actually been served these for real in peoples houses....scary! Don´t worry, we will get them eventually.
Okay as for conference. It ended up being the biggest fiasco to date on the mission. It is only transmitted in Braga , Porto, and Coimbra. SO, we had about 10 missionaries coming to Braga to watch the Session on Saturday (we only have one, sat afternoon is shown Sunday afternoon at one, then we have sessions at 5 and at 9) We also were picking up Erica and everything was set. About 3.10 (session starts at 5) we get a call saying that the equipment is broken, and there will be no conference in Braga...everyone needs to go to Porto (1 hour 15 minutes by train). SO, we were in an appointment, desperately called a taxi and everyone in Braga made a mad dash for the train station to catch the 3.30. We made it there first and bought tickets for the Elders and the other Irmãs.20 minutes had already passed. Luckily we got the majority of that session and Sunday the equipment was fixed so we could watch the first two sessions, then we had to go home. BUT,it was amazing and I am so thankful for the ability we have to hear the words of a living profeta. It is truly a blessing to have the council of the Lord for our day. I can not wait until the Liahona comes out and I can read them again (or the ones that I didn´t get to see). I loved the emphasis on the temple, that is something I have really been studying lately and it really is amazing how much w e can learn from every aspect of it...not even just the ordinances, but the sacrifice to go and everything it entails. Everyone needs to go for me, because I don´t get a chance for another year!
Anyway, that's it for Braga, stay tuned for the next episode!
Love
Irmã Ray"
Second - I am so horrible! I got this letter a week ago and it has still taken me FOREVER to post it... I'm not sure how many people actually read her letters via blog anyway, but still! This is for her to have all her emails on record as well... done and done. Enjoy!!!
- Ridiculouslygoodlooking
P.S. There is a picture attached below that relates to the letter - enjoy that as well!
April 6, 2009
"Hey Hey!
Hope that everyone had a marvelous and wonderful conference weekend. Ours was definitely eventful. It started off with service at painting the school again. We had a great opportunity to play with some of the kids afterwards. I am ashamed to admit that we missionaries were completely thrashed in soccer by a small group of elementary to middle school special education children. Very embarrassing, but it was a lot of fun. They were great.
Next, divisions with the sisters from Guimarães. I drew the short straw and therefore got to forgo the set appointment and had the opportunity to knock doors de novo. It was good because I have been wanting to knock an area for a long time, but since my companion isn´t really big on the whole finding new people thing, we haven´t done it yet. HOWEVER, Irmã Solles is a rock star and so we decided to take on the hill (a certain area by our house). We were feeling really good about ourselves until it became apparent by looking through the windows that the first house we knocked had no one living there. Not to be deterred, we continued on and to our surprise we were invited in at the next house. Little to our knowledge it ended up being 3 very old Jehovah´s Witness die hards. After about 30 minutes we managed to escape with our bibles (he almost kept one) and a small part of our sanity. Don´t worry, all of you were included as well as he pretty much cursed anyone we had ever talked to. The funny thing was the next house we knocked the man asked us if we were JW and when we said no he said good, what is your message...I don´t like them. At that point neither did we. I have to admit I had the very un-Christlike urge at one point to kick the stool out from underneath the poor guy. HOWEVER, I did not, and we all escaped on friendly terms...more or less.
To go back in time just a bit...April Fools Day is also a Portuguese holiday, but the whole idea of pranks is totally lost to them. Unfortunately we tried to use a member as our in to get the Elders, so the whole thing went up in smoke as she TOTALLY gave everything away. It was a bit of a bummer as I was so kindly surprised with a special treat in my food after district meeting...see attached picture.The sad thing is I have actually been served these for real in peoples houses....scary! Don´t worry, we will get them eventually.
Okay as for conference. It ended up being the biggest fiasco to date on the mission. It is only transmitted in Braga , Porto, and Coimbra. SO, we had about 10 missionaries coming to Braga to watch the Session on Saturday (we only have one, sat afternoon is shown Sunday afternoon at one, then we have sessions at 5 and at 9) We also were picking up Erica and everything was set. About 3.10 (session starts at 5) we get a call saying that the equipment is broken, and there will be no conference in Braga...everyone needs to go to Porto (1 hour 15 minutes by train). SO, we were in an appointment, desperately called a taxi and everyone in Braga made a mad dash for the train station to catch the 3.30. We made it there first and bought tickets for the Elders and the other Irmãs.
Anyway, that's it for Braga, stay tuned for the next episode!
Love
Irmã Ray"
The Best way to write Sarah is:
1) On the internet go to dearelder.com website.
2) There is a drop down box on the right hand side down just a couple inches. Enter her mission which is Portugal Porto and then click "write a letter" just below where you select the mission.
3) On the next screen enter your return address and Sister Sarah Ray in the address line, add your email in the email box below the envelope.
4) Write your letter in the text box and then hit the "send letter" box under the text box to send it on.
This site does require US $.94 Postage. You can set up an account and it will deduct the postage each time you write.
2) The alternate way for sending anything (i.e. letters, packages, etc) through regular US mail is below. This method requires US $.94 postage for letters.
Sister Sarah Ray
Rua Padre Antonio Vieira
Nº91 5º Tras
Braga 4710-374
Portugal
Monday, April 6, 2009
This Week's Top 5!!!
Here are Sarah's Top 5 awesome moments from this past week - Enjoy!!!
- Ridiculouslygoodlooking
P.S. If you are not currently writing, Sarah... You should be. The end.
"From Sister Sarah Ray
March 30, 2009
Well, looks like our hard work is finally starting to pay off. This week we had a lot of really cool experiences.
#1 most exciting....we marked Erica for baptism in about a month. Of course that probably means that I won´t be here anymore, but oh well.
#2 We had a really cool experience with a Fª Cravo that we have been working with. We planned to teach them about fasting about two weeks ago, and haven´t actually been able to mark with them till the end of this past week. We were really frustrated with this, but as always, everything happens for a reason and we found out why. They told us that they have been trying to decide if they are going to move back to Brazil because of the economy or if they are going to stay here in Portugal. They prayed to find a way in that they could determine the right course, and two days later we showed up with our fasting message. Waldimir told us that he knew we were the answer to his prayer and they actually were fasting yesterday for one of the first times. It was a really cool experience because it definitely was not us teaching. We had a strange moment where he misunderstood the scripture reference and read one that we didn´t have prepared, but it ended up being exactly the answer that they needed. Crazy how the Spirit works sometimes. He also had the experience to bless the sacrament again this week. The last time he blessed he needed to repeat the prayer about 6 times, so he was really nervous this week. However, he knew he would have the spirit with him because he was fasting. We found out afterwards that when he got up there he was so emotional that he couldn´t read, but he said he prayed, closed his eyes, and the words just came. The spirit was way strong in our work this week. It was definitely an answer to my prayers to be able to see that our work is actually doing some good here.
#3 We had an awesome zone conference completely centered on the atonement and Queda and it was really cool. I feel like I actually understand a little more of it, and really wanted to go to the temple right afterwards. I think that I might actually understand small portion of the endowment. President made this chart about what things were good and bad about the garden of Eden, what things were good and bad after the Queda, and after the atonement. It was interesting that in the garden half were good and half were bad, after the fall, they switched places. It was still half and half but there were the other ones. He also showed us how the bad things of the garden are taken out of the bible, and as a result the good things about the fall are taken out as well. Then we looked at after the atonement and they all had plus marks...Christ really took care of everything. It is amazing. I am so thankful for the gospel!!!! It is such an amazing blessing to have in our lives.
#4 Funny story of the week. We had a service project on Saturday where we were painting a school for kids with learning disabilities. Well, we had to leave early because we had a baptism that afternoon, so about 2 we said goodbye to everyone and the missionaries exited the building. Then we found out that we were locked inside the compound and could not for the life of us find a way out....(how many missionaries does it take to open a gate...apparently more than 4) SO, being the smart people we are, we managed to squeeze out of the roof of the parking area and hop the fence. Hopefully no one saw this and associated it with missionaries...they probably thought we were breaking in or something. Luckily because we were painting, we were in pants. Blessing indeed.
#5 Funny story #2. We have decided to start taking the stairs in our apartment building, we have a small problem in that the lights in our building seem to not work most of the time. So as a result we called the elevator, which has light inside that you can see go floor to floor and pushed the button to go down 1 floor, closed the doors and ran down the stairs with the light. Opened the door on the next floor, pushed the button for the 3rd floor and ran down one flight of stairs. it was quite interesting, but we used the stairs for all 6 floors!
The church is true.
Irmã Ray"
The BEST way to write Sarah is:
1) On the internet go to dearelder.com website.
2) There is a drop down box on the right hand side down just a couple inches. Enter her mission which is Portugal Porto and then click "write a letter" just below where you select the mission.
3) On the next screen enter your return address and Sister Sarah Ray in the address line, add your email in the email box below the envelope.
4) Write your letter in the text box and then hit the "send letter" box under the text box to send it on.
This site does require US $.94 Postage. You can set up an account and it will deduct the postage each time you write.
2) The alternate way for sending anything (i.e. letters, packages, etc) through regular US mail is below. This method requires US $.94 postage for letters.
Sister Sarah Ray
Rua Padre Antonio Vieira
- Ridiculouslygoodlooking
P.S. If you are not currently writing, Sarah... You should be. The end.
"From Sister Sarah Ray
March 30, 2009
Well, looks like our hard work is finally starting to pay off. This week we had a lot of really cool experiences.
#1 most exciting....we marked Erica for baptism in about a month. Of course that probably means that I won´t be here anymore, but oh well.
#2 We had a really cool experience with a Fª Cravo that we have been working with. We planned to teach them about fasting about two weeks ago, and haven´t actually been able to mark with them till the end of this past week. We were really frustrated with this, but as always, everything happens for a reason and we found out why. They told us that they have been trying to decide if they are going to move back to Brazil because of the economy or if they are going to stay here in Portugal. They prayed to find a way in that they could determine the right course, and two days later we showed up with our fasting message. Waldimir told us that he knew we were the answer to his prayer and they actually were fasting yesterday for one of the first times. It was a really cool experience because it definitely was not us teaching. We had a strange moment where he misunderstood the scripture reference and read one that we didn´t have prepared, but it ended up being exactly the answer that they needed. Crazy how the Spirit works sometimes. He also had the experience to bless the sacrament again this week. The last time he blessed he needed to repeat the prayer about 6 times, so he was really nervous this week. However, he knew he would have the spirit with him because he was fasting. We found out afterwards that when he got up there he was so emotional that he couldn´t read, but he said he prayed, closed his eyes, and the words just came. The spirit was way strong in our work this week. It was definitely an answer to my prayers to be able to see that our work is actually doing some good here.
#3 We had an awesome zone conference completely centered on the atonement and Queda and it was really cool. I feel like I actually understand a little more of it, and really wanted to go to the temple right afterwards. I think that I might actually understand small portion of the endowment. President made this chart about what things were good and bad about the garden of Eden, what things were good and bad after the Queda, and after the atonement. It was interesting that in the garden half were good and half were bad, after the fall, they switched places. It was still half and half but there were the other ones. He also showed us how the bad things of the garden are taken out of the bible, and as a result the good things about the fall are taken out as well. Then we looked at after the atonement and they all had plus marks...Christ really took care of everything. It is amazing. I am so thankful for the gospel!!!! It is such an amazing blessing to have in our lives.
#4 Funny story of the week. We had a service project on Saturday where we were painting a school for kids with learning disabilities. Well, we had to leave early because we had a baptism that afternoon, so about 2 we said goodbye to everyone and the missionaries exited the building. Then we found out that we were locked inside the compound and could not for the life of us find a way out....(how many missionaries does it take to open a gate...apparently more than 4) SO, being the smart people we are, we managed to squeeze out of the roof of the parking area and hop the fence. Hopefully no one saw this and associated it with missionaries...they probably thought we were breaking in or something. Luckily because we were painting, we were in pants. Blessing indeed.
#5 Funny story #2. We have decided to start taking the stairs in our apartment building, we have a small problem in that the lights in our building seem to not work most of the time. So as a result we called the elevator, which has light inside that you can see go floor to floor and pushed the button to go down 1 floor, closed the doors and ran down the stairs with the light. Opened the door on the next floor, pushed the button for the 3rd floor and ran down one flight of stairs. it was quite interesting, but we used the stairs for all 6 floors!
The church is true.
Irmã Ray"
The BEST way to write Sarah is:
1) On the internet go to dearelder.com website.
2) There is a drop down box on the right hand side down just a couple inches. Enter her mission which is Portugal Porto and then click "write a letter" just below where you select the mission.
3) On the next screen enter your return address and Sister Sarah Ray in the address line, add your email in the email box below the envelope.
4) Write your letter in the text box and then hit the "send letter" box under the text box to send it on.
This site does require US $.94 Postage. You can set up an account and it will deduct the postage each time you write.
2) The alternate way for sending anything (i.e. letters, packages, etc) through regular US mail is below. This method requires US $.94 postage for letters.
Sister Sarah Ray
Rua Padre Antonio Vieira
Nº91 5º Tras
Braga 4710-374
Portugal
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