Macacos me mordom!

This is my new idiomatic phrase, "Macacos me mordom!" It is in one of our Portuguese textbooks, and is supposed to mean, "I'll be darned!" but it literally translates into, "Monkeys bite me!" :D haha, but unfortunately, one of the Brazilian teachers in Sao Paulo said that they don't actually say that in Brazil. What a shame. But we say it all the time now as a district!

The first week or so here has been so amazing, and so jam-packed with activities. We were very fortunate as incoming missionaries to have a surprise visit from apostle Elder Holland! He randomly came into our meeting and testified that he knew what we were doing was the most important thing we could be doing right now. It was amazing. For Sunday's devotional, we heard from Susan E. Black, a professor at BYU! She is sooo good and she talked about the life of the prophet Joseph Smith from his young childhood to the time of the First Vision in 1820. It was very interesting, and she told stories about him I had never heard before, like when Lucy Mack Smith (his mom) accidentally left him behind after stopping at an inn during their move to Palmyra, New York, in the middle of the winter! Poor kid!

Anyway, this week we learned a ton in Portuguese, and as a companionship, we taught our first lesson (in English) and did our first street contact (in Portuguese). The girl that volunteered for us to teach had actually spent a year in Curitiba, so she was very excited for me to go there. :) She told me to make sure I always looked like I knew what I was doing, and never to have the "tourist face" so people won't pickpocket me :) and she demonstrated for me. It was great.

My companions and I always get up and go to the gym at 6 am. Even though it means an hour of less sleep, they have a professional instructor there teaching kick boxing, Pilates, and other exercises. It's great, and it's only for the Sisters, so we have the whole gym and all the equipment to ourselves.

Twice a week now they have Large Group Meetings only for Brazil missionaries. They are soooo helpful in giving us handouts and other tools for learning the language faster, I love it! Well, I better go, hope everyone is having a great week!