Carnival

Oi!

Haha sounds like the house is back to its noisy crazy self! Tell Grandmas and Grandpa hi for me will you? Yes I usually get grandmas letters but not every week cause we only get mail every month or so. But I got your Valentines Package Last week! Thanks a ton! My comp says thanks also! Also I got a letter from jake so I will send it to you guys and you can send it to him. So it will probably be easier to just copy and send any history because it is 1 real for every page printed.

So Carnival definitely seemed a bit exaggerated to me. haha Probably was really wild at the beachs and center, but for us it was just a few people on the streets with everything closed and having to go home at 6. Nothing bad.  haha But good news! Last week an old investigator of 10 years called us. We went over and he had a few questions about temples and kolob. haha he knows Everything because of the internet. Anyways we had a member bare his testimony and then assigned him a chapter to read and pray about. Then Saturday we did spilts, my comp went with the member to his house and he got an answer through a dream and will be baptized this Saturday! Im really excited for this so we will see what happens. He also has a little kid and a wife, we will try to work with the wife too. When we did splits another member and I did lots of contacts and found a great family just 10 minutes to the chapel. We will try and work with them, he said he was satisfied with his church now but sounded really interested in the fact that we have the priesthood and eternal families. I have definitely notice attitude makes a world of difference. I’m definitely not perfect but try to have a good attitude and I usually want to work and love it! Anyways thanks so much again for everything. I see the results or your guy’s prayers everyday. Just today I looked at the thermometer at it was 100 in our apartment and 116 outside. While it seemed hot to me, definitely not that hot! haha For sure we have the help of the Lord because of prayers. Thanks you all so much! Love, Connor

Hottest Month of the Year

Oi! Happy Valentines Day! Glad to hear that you got a little rain! Hope you guys get more soon! It has been super hot here, I guess February is the hottest month, good thing it is also the shortest. haha. That is awsome about Colton and TJ. I’m sad I can’t be at their farewells, but Ill be there for their homecomings. I bet Chile will be awesome! Unfortunately no, we didn´t have the opportunity to go to the Worldwide Leadership training, sounds like it was pretty awesome though! I will have to try and read some of it. So I haven´t gotten the package yet from you or the ward, but they might be at the mission office, not sure but I’ll let you know.  Hey question. The Murrays from our old ward have a son that went on a mission to San Diego a few years back? Because we have DVDs from preach my gospel and one of the missionaries is Elder Murray from Draper Utah. haha

 So no I haven´t heard about the police strike during carnival, hopefully that doesn’t happen, probably wouldn´t be good. From what I heard Carnival starts this Friday at 4, and goes until next Wednesday or Thursday. The members are saying that Rio seriously shuts down to drink and party. No stores will be open and I will only be able to email next week if the president lets us email from a member’s house. Should be really interesting because the president isn’t changing anything for the first time. We will work until 9 pm like usual. I really don’t know how things are things are going to go with that so we will see. haha. So yesterday I gave a talk about the importance of members in missionary work in sacrament. It went pretty well I think, obviously my Portuguese has some work still but the members said they liked it so that is good. haha. I love learning and trying new things as well so I will have to try that and see how it works out.

So this week we had a few people commit to be baptized and I will pray that it works out. The first are two women that we are teaching, their daughter/sister is a member and we think they will be baptized this Sunday or the next. The second is a man who is dating a less active member. He has been to church a lot and wants to be baptized, unfortunately they live together, this happens a lot. But they actually want to marry so we think they will be baptized April 15.  Still we have lots of investigators that are really interested, but fail to progress, so we are still working with people. Thank you so much for the love and support. It means the world. You guys are the best parents and the best family I could ask for. Send my love to everyone! Love Connor.

Allergic to Acai

Oi! Sorry this week will probably be short, we were playing soccer (in plus 100 degrees, haha) as a zone and I only have a little while. Anyways

Im way glad Florida was fun and worked out well!! It sounds like it was really nice there! That is extremely cool about your conversation about the church! haha sounds like you still got the missionary skill! But really it is nice even if it just helps people to have a little bit more understanding.

I definitely agree on the change in the individual missionary to. I have learned and grown so much in such short time! That is soo cool you stayed in the same hotel as Mitt Romney! Now I really hope he wins so I can say my parents stayed in the same hotel as the President. hahah.

Good luck to him! haha If you could get me Jakes new address that would be awesome! I need to tell Jake congrats! That is way cool! Thanks so much for the addresses and info and stuff!!! It is extremely nice to know I have someone looking out for me. Anyways still no baptisms, I admit I´m really hoping we have one soon. Unfortunately I had to stay inside for a day last week because I am allergic to Açai, a berry but they turn in into an ice cream snack here. haha nothing serious just a bit annoying. Its been really hot, I guess February is the hottest and driest month so if I can just last through this.. haha but Everybody here is getting ready for Carnival in a couple of weeks. It will be interesting to see what happens, I hear we get almost no work done, but we will try. We had a couple investigators in church. A mom and daughter, friends of some recent convert. She works a lot but we will try to get ahold of her this week and see what happens. I actually speak in church next week so wish me luck.


 We lost Elder Connell, and gained Elder Knight. He also has about 6 months. He is really nice and way cool. Finally another U fan!! haha P days is usually rest and hang out, but we have played soccer twice now. And gone to the field of Vasco, one of the big teams here. Ill let you know if we do anything else really cool. We have a washer but not a drying, not that bad though when its 100 degrees you don’t need a dryer. We haven´t really done any site seeing, though I would love to. I’m not sure about the address I will get back to you. Tell Jake and Colton congrates and good luck for me! That is really awesome! That is also really sweet about Grandma, I really hope you guys are being blessed and all doing okay. Again thank you so much for the love and support. I really can´t express how thankful I am to have you guys as family and friends. You all have made such a positive difference in my life. Thank you all so much. I´m am still great in Brazil! Connor




Keep on Keeping On

Oi! One transfer down, many more to go! haha. So yes I got the box with spices, and we pretty much have all the basics so don’t worry about that. If we don’t have something I will tell you. Thanks for the help of the addresses. Tell Cole congrats on battle of the bands! Sounds like it would have been very cool to see. I am doing great as always! We had lots of ward meetings yesterday to figure out how to get the members to work with us more. I think this will really help, for example we had probably 10 investigators planning on going to church, 1 came. It’s hard to get them to wake up especially when we can’t visit them all, so we are working on getting people to church right now. Nothing extremely promising right now, but Ill keep you updated. Lots of investigators, few progressing. But I love the work anyways! It really is awesome to bear your testimony and feel the spirit, know that they know also. We taught a class in Sunday school yesterday about the spirit, chapter 4 of preach my gospel. Really really good, i love that chapter and encourage you guys to read it. Anyways hope that you are having fun in Florida! Don’t party too much, haha Love you all and thanks for everything! Love Elder Ottosen

Zone Activity

 Oi!! Im glad to hear that you guys got some moisture! Hopefully the flooding wasn’t too bad, sounds pretty crazy though. You wouldn’t believe some of the floods that can happen here. Last Friday I guess there was water 2 feet high in a part of our area.  Training went really well with the president. As I said I really like him and I love how focused he is on teaching by the spirit. Today we went to the field of Vasco, one of the teams here. It was way cool and really old, definitely different that any stadium I’ve visited before. Then we played soccer as a zone. Lets just say I have a lot of work. haha but It was way fun. We had a few investigators in church this past week. A part member family, a older woman, and a young man. We are doing a plan with the ward to go to with a member every day. That should help a lot because it is super hard to have members with lessons. And ideally we should have them all with members. We honestly didn’t have a lot of time to work this past week. We lost all of Monday and Tuesday, and big parts of Wednesday and Thursday because of district meeting and interviews with the president. Then I was out on Saturday because of food poisoning I think, not to sure what it was but I’m better now so there is no need to worry. We did divisions yesterday night with members and I went to a house where the parents are members but the daughter wasn’t. It was really cool cause the member and me bore our testimonies, then the parents bore theirs. Nothing invites the spirit like a testimony. It is so cool to see that we don’t actually do the teaching, the spirit does. I need to remember this and not get in the way. You are so right gratitude makes our lives soo much better. I have really gained so much more gratitude for everything since I came down here. We literally have soo much. Anyways hope everyone is healthy and safe. I love you all and am soo grateful to have you all in my life! Love, Connor