Tuesday, August 25, 2009

It's almost Fall in Coimbra!

Hey Everyone!

Here's another update on Sarah and her wonderful mission in Portugal - Quick question for you... Have you told her lately, that you love her? Haha... Seriously. Take out a piece of paper, write two paragraphs to her, and send it - NOW. It will mean the world to her, as I have said before... So, here is her update: Enjoy!

"From Sister Sarah Ray
August 17, 2009

So we did have a great week this week, despite the fact that it is August. We have managed to find a couple more people here in Coimbra. Of course they are all really old as well, but that seems to be our population here right now. However, we did develop a new talent. Due to the fact that the temperatures have skyrocketed to over 100, we have become very adept at picking out which are the very few buses in Coimbra that have air conditioning. It doesn´t work very well, but it is better than nothing and we have definitely been trying to take advantage of the opportunities.

We have also managed to have some rocking awesome lessons. We have been teaching a woman named Alda for a while now, but she really hasn´t been doing a whole lot. Well, she has two kids so this week we played the game of life, missionary style, which basically covers the 2nd and 3rd lessons. You have to have all the cards of faith, repentance, baptism, gift of the Hold Ghost and Endure to the End to win. So we talked about how that was how we could follow the path that God gave us, and we finally hit home. She has a completely different aspect of the gospel now, was asking questions, wants to know, wants to pray, wants to read, and we are SO EXCITED! Months of prayers that have finally happened.

We also had a pretty interesting experience visiting Elisabete this week. So, she has vacation from the crazy bin this week, and all she has missed for the past 10 years is Chocolate Chip cookies. SO, we tried our best with the crazy little easy bake oven that we have and turned out something that resembled Chocolate chip cookies and took them to her. We had to wait a couple of minutes for the nurse to go get her and in that time we became quite the celebrities with the other patients that were there. It ended with us sitting on a bench teaching 8 people who then wanted us to come back tomorrow. While nomally we would be thrilled at that aspect, due to the situations, we will go back next week. It was pretty funny though...we are thinking about just starting to teach up in the front of a bus and see if we get kicked off next. Who knows.
All in all it has been a pretty fun week, despite the frustrations. Irmã Call is awesome and is great at keeping up the good attitude even when everything goes wrong, we are in the heat and want to die. I really am thankful for the opportunity that I have to be here. It is amazing to see peoples lives change. Thank you for all of the support! Love you all!


Irmã Ray


From Sister Sarah Ray
August 24, 2009

Well transfers came through this week and I am staying in Coimbra. I have also adopted a small green monster as a pet named jealousy as I am sending Irmã Call off to Madeira. Bum, she is also going to serve with my #1 choice of companion if I could pick. However, the good news is my #2 choice (besides Irmã Call of course) is going to be my new companion. Her name is Irmã Draper and I have yet another American. Looks like I am going to be in the states probably from here on out. Our natives are pretty much all leaving soon, so we will see how it works out. However, people here sure seem to like Americans. We were talking to a guy in the square the other day and when he found out Irmã Call was from Utah he got all excited and said something I never expected to hear in Portugal "I love the Utah Jazz"....What the ?!?! Needless to say as soon as he left we both died laughing.

Other than that, this week has been pretty dry....but luckily we are coming up on the end of the feirias!!!WOO HOO! I am one happy missionary with that in mind. We also get to have a spend the night in the mission home, since the plane to Madeira leaves way early...we have to be in the mission home Wednesday night, so that will be interesting.

Alda is still doing well. Despite the fact that we have already taught her everything se seems to be taking it all in like she had never heard of it before. Maybe that is why we started over again. So we were talking about Profetas this week and she was worried that not everyone knew that we had a profeta today. She said we should do something to let everyone know to which we answered..."Alda, why do you think we are here." She was pretty shocked to learn that we have over 53,000 missionaries. She is doing really well though!!!

Well, stay tuned and hopefully I will have some more interesting stories over the next few weeks with the people coming back to Coimbra! Till next week! LOve you all.

Irmã Ray
PS Anyone who wants letters back has to let me know their new school address....."

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

Portugal Porto Mission

Rua de Amalia Luazes

No.23 Sala 1

4200-052 Porto

PORTUGAL

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