Sunday, March 16, 2011‏

Hey Family,

I´m sorry for writing so late today but i just barely found out whats happening to me and Elder Thredgold for transfers. Were getting white washed and i´m heading to the area where i will probably end my mission, while Elder Thredgold is heading to an area up near Lisbon. My new area is Evora. Its the "middle of no where" Portugal where there are few members and the members that are active, are weird. The last three duplas of missionaries that have served there were slackers and the branch there didnt seem to like them much. I´m white washing it with a young Elder named Elder Filrup so we´ll see how it goes. One of the missionaries who was serving there is going home early next week so he´ll be with us for a while to show us around the area. I talked to him a minute ago and he says the area is like the last three areas i´ve had...dead. And he also said the branch is falling apart so these final transfers will be fun.

This week was a pretty good week. we talked to that family we helped but we didnt feel anything too strongly from them. We felt after the lesson that they listened to us because they felt bad about accepting food from the church. we still dont know whats going to happen with them but hopefully the new elders here will get things going for them. The African family we found a few weeks ago wasnt home when we past by them(after marking the appointment) so they too lost some points in my book. Thats 3 or 4 appointments that they´ve skipped out on in a row so i´m not too happy with them.

In other mission news, Elder Thomas, who i served with a year ago, is going home this week. He was my zone Leader these past two transfers and it was good to remember the good times when we had a bunch of baptisms together. But now hes headed home and is planning on seeing me at BYU. He doesnt know if he´s going to BYU or UVU but will be in the same general area. last week we went to the beach as a zone and played football in the sand. It ws fun because 3 of the Elders there were or had been my companions. It was also really fun because the other people on the beach had now idea what we were doing. Then on Friday, the other elders in our district called us because they needed our projector again so we headed over there and spent the entire day with them. They had 4 baptisms that day(one dupla had 3 the other had 1) and afterward they had a dance for the members and recent converts. As missionaries we couldn´t do much much but we made sure to enjoy the food and to laugh at the members. I took a bunch of videos and pictures so i´ll have to send those to you guys another day.

We also didnt have zone Conference this week because the mission´s planning got all screwed up. They´re going to have it this week which will be annoying because its going to be really expensive to go back and forth form my area. So i might have to pull out some more money, even though i promised i wouldn´t, but i dont have much of a choice. Sorry.

I´m glad to hear that BYU is doing better than they were last week. All the missionaries who are BYU fans(and there are a few) were heartbroken all last week. But knowing we did better this week cheered us up a bit, so thanks for the updates dad!

You can also tell Jenny that i got both her emails, even though i forgot to delete some emails. My inbox shouldn´t even be close to being full because we have gmail now and our in boxs are huge, but i´ll delete some stuff just in case.

And i dont mind living with Mikey at all. I´ve actually been looking forward to it(but not too much, because thats trunkey). I thought i might be able to room with Elder Thomas, but he doesnt know where hes going to school so i´ll just plan on chilling with Mikey.

Well, i think thats it for news. I´m really going to need your guys´ prayers in my new area, but i know you guys are always praying for me because i´m always seeing the blessing from those prayers. So thanks again for all the love and support! Eu amo vocês!

Com amor,
Élder Haws