hey--

so this week has been pretty good. the time is flying away. it seems like each p-day is closer and closer, and i don´t even know portugueses that well yet. i can´t believe that its aready been this long in the field--the first transfer is almost over.

but anyway...things are good here. i´m having fun and we´ve found some good people. we haven´t had a whole bunch of success yet though. i don´t really speak portuguese all that well, and this is my comp´s first time as a senior companion. this first transfer has been really good and i´ve learned a bunch, but at the same time, we haven´t baptized anyone and have had a hard time getting people to church. (don´t worry--i´m not complaining and i´m doing fine, but my comp and I have just learned a whole bunch and are figuring everything out). We work hard and are very diligent, and now, are learning how to baptize and how to get people to accept the Gospel (i hope this isn´t confusing, it might be...). Anyway, i love it here and am so grateful to serve and help the people down here.

story: So, you´ve all probably heard about the water down here and how you can´t drink it, right? yeah. well that´s what they told us in the CTM too. don´t drink the water. you´ll get diarrhea forever and it´ll be super bad. then, in the CTM, they told us about this fancy new water bottleswith water purifiers on them which are, "really awesome. you can put any type of water in it and it´ll purify it just like that. only drink from that bottle. carry it everywhere, and don´t lose it." soooooo.......i lost mine. first night. i picked it up in the president´s home. had it with me during the bus-ride to campos. i think it slipped out in the taxi from the bus station to the house, never to be seen again.

However, it hasn´t been that big of a deal. after the initial panic and the thought of diarrhea for the next 2 years, I calmed down and talked to some people who said, "yeah, it´s not that big of a deal, I drink all the water they give me." so i do too. and it hasn´t been that big of a deal. i drink all the water, and have only had diarrhea twice. pretty good, eh?

the second time was last week. I don´t really know what cause it, and have tried to isolate and identify any possible causes. first, and less likely: the shake that i made the day before. we fixed the smoothie maker we have, so that morning for breakfast, i took the pineapple and 4 bananas i had bought the day before and made a delicious shake. it was awesome, but i ended up eating almost the entire thing by myself. ekstrom had super bad canker-soures in his mouth and refused to try it, and the other two people in the house only had a little. so maybe my body just counldn´t handle a pineapple and 4 bananas.

More likely cause #2: the cake i had the previous day at an investigators house. she gave us this cake, and i noticed these little spots on the cake. "hey," i thought to myself, "that looks like mold. except, it can´t be mold. i can see it all the way from here, and its all over the place. she would notice it and wouldn´t give us the cake if it really was mold. naahhh...its fine." No. It was mold. it was covering the top and had grown into the cake. and i didn´t realize it until after, when i asked my comp why he didn´t finish his cake and he confirmed my fears.

Well....hope you´re all doing good. food poisoning isn´t that bad, the gospel is true, and i love it here in brazil. love you guys and hope you´re all doing great. love--

Elder Tyler Tasso