Yesterday my bud answered some of my questions. I just love him.

Hey Bud!
This week flew by for me, how about for you? I have more questions.....
1. When do you get to go back to the temple?
2. What fun stuff do you get to do on your p-day?
3. How about that less active family? I hate to see people leave the church. I know it happens for many different reasons but it breaks my heart. All I know is that everything good in my life has come from living the Gospel.
4. What are the stores like? I know how much you hate shopping but do they have just tiny stores or do they have like a Walmart.
5. Is there anything you'd specifically like for Christmas?
6. Have you gotten your package?
7. What's your favorite part of your day?
8. Do you love Sundays?
9. Are you bored with your ties?
10. You left some sweaters, I was thinking of sending them. Do you want me to? I know it's getting warmer so maybe later?


1. Next transfer I might go to the temple if my area isn´t too far away. So if I get transferred to Pelotas or some place far away, then yeah I won´t be going to the temple again for who knows how long.

2. The language is going well. when I´m humble, I can speak so much better. But yeah basically, I can speak with any random person on the street and hold a conversation about myself, missionary work, or the gospel. Regular conversations are coming along though. Everyday I see improvements. The fact that I can speak, read, and write what I can in Portuguese after 3 months, is a miracle. Seriously, it´s amazing to be apart of all of this.   At first it was really hard. I didn´t know anyone, my companion (although American) didn´t speak any English to me the first month. So yeah I felt pretty alone sometimes, but now its way better. My Portuguese is good enough to where my companion and I speak a little more English. 

3. The sad thing is is that I can´t remember which inactive family i was talking to you about. But basically no families have returned. so i guess that answers that question.

4.The stores here are pretty much the same. a little smaller and way different stuff to buy, but basically the same. I´ve only seen walmart in Sao Paulo by the way. That reminds me as well, here there is 0 fast food. In porto alegre they have some, but besides that, there´s nothing. It´s way different. i always talk about this with my companion. Life is America is so much faster than life down here. Up there people rush, eat and drive, and do other things. Here people take things easy, eat at the table with their families and other things like that. That´s something I like about down here.

5. For Christmas, ties, CDs, pictures, and a baseball. I specifically want a picture from my baptism. It would help a lot with some of the kids down here.

6. I have not received my package yet. We´re going to Porto Alegre today and it might be there, but probably not.

7. My day´s are great. They´re all the same but at the same time, always different. My favorite part of the day is probably going to bed, not going to lie. I´m always exhausted. But besides this... I´m not sure. Oh, having just a super good lesson with someone who is ready to hear it. That´s something I really like.

8. I do love Sundays. We get to sing with the primary, eat a delicious almoço after church, and teach.

9. I´m kinda bored with my ties. Haha, I only have 8 or 9. as you can imagine, sometimes I do get bored with them.

10.Don´t worry about the sweaters. Maybe next June you should send them.

I´m loving my mission right now and time is flying by.
Love you Mom,


See that, he loves me.

From my boy today. I just love him.

Well this past week was great. It was really hot, 38 degrees celsius. Naturally, we ate bastante sorvete. This week was also my last week in my first transfer. Crazy how fast it went by. I got the call that Elder G and I will stay here for 6 more weeks. We´re pretty pumped. Lots of work to be done. We are so close to baptizing many people. We attribute this to our fast we had this week. Whenever we have a fast we ALWAYS see success. This principle of the fast is something that I never really used before my mission. But it really does work.

People here are upset about our spies that were spying on their president. We don´t really here much, but what we do hear is pretty biased against the United States. One guy told us that all of europe including england and russia are backing behind Brazil. Basically he alluded to the fact that he thinks there will be a war and that the US will be sorry for spying on Brazil. Pretty crazy.

Well Elder G and I are really getting closer. He´s a really cool guy. I learned that he played the computer game Age of Empires before his mission. How awesome is that? well it´s awesome for me.

Anyways, hope everyone is doing well. I´m enjoying my time down here in Rio Grande do Sul.

Elder Holloway

Just got this today. He sounds good and that makes me happy.

This week was fantastic. We had the most contacts we´ve ever had, the most lessons, and we had a baptism. It was great. We worked super hard, and I don´t even know where the time went. time on the mission really does go by fast.

This week was a little different as well. The mother of a a woman in the branch passed away. The death was expected, but it was still sad. I had the opportunity to be a pallbearer(?). That was interesting. I´ve already seen and done so many things that I couldn´t even dreamed of before the mission.

7th of setember was brazil´s independence day. There was a parade and it was pretty cool. The only thing is, is that the Gauchos down here don´t like Brazil. Hardly anyone sang the national anthem of Brazil, it was hilarious. the 20th of setember commemorates the day the Gauchos tried to break away from Brazil. Everyone is super excited for this day. All the Gauchos dress up, get on their horses and drink chimarro. It´s actually going to be really cool.

Theres this line in Nacho Libre that goes like this : And that is a crazy lady.everyday here I say that in my head. But really.. every day i see crazy ladys. I do love the people down here, even the crazy ones. They´re all Children of God and my favorite thing about living down here is conversing and teaching people down here.

if you all are curious as to what I might be doing during the day, at around 9 or 930 mountain standard time, there is a 95% chance I´m eating rice and beans with members.

Elder Holloway

Some pictures we recently recieved.

We recieved this email a couple of weeks ago. I felt like I needed some answers to specific questions so I sent him this list of questions:

1) are you warm?
2) do you live with members or have your own place?
3) do you have a maid?
4) are your shoes holding up?
5) do you need a mosquito net? for summer?
6) what would you like in your care package? peanut butter? socks? a new tie? treats that don't go stale?
7) are you doing good?
8) will you get to go to the temple sometime?
9) do you enjoy teaching?
10) what are your duties at church?
11) how big is the branch?

Here are his answers:

1) Yes, I am warm!
2) We have our own little place. And I mean little. Theres also little food in it. Classic missionary apartment
3) my maid is myself
4) my shoes are amazingly comfortable. But i did have to buy boot/work shoes for the mud and rain.
5) I´m not sure if I will need a mosquito net. I will let you know.
6)Peanut butter, face lotion, face wash (classic me, I know) stuff that won´t go stale, chocolate also. But make sure that if it were to melt during transport, it wouldn´t ruin everything else.
7) I´m doing good. Sometimes its tough. I think about home and how far away I am and how much more time I have and sometimes its depressing. But when you´re climbing a mountain, sometimes its better to look at your feet than to look at how much more you have.
8) I am going to the temple on the 28th. Which reminds me, my p day next week might not be monday. It might be wednesday the 28th, because of the temple;.
9) I love teaching people. It beats street contacting or batendo casas
10) We teach gospel principles and we are basically the servants of this branch. We aren´t supposed to be, but we´re working on this.
11) This past sunday we have 45 people show up. Woo! the problem here is number of priesthood brethren. There are 6 or 7 I think.

He also wrote this...

 

 

Well this week was pretty standard. Beans and rice. Everyday. Luckily i like beans and rice, otherwise this mission would be the most difficult thing of my life haha.

THis week I had my first baptism. Elder G and I invited, set up, planned and literally did everything for this baptism. I baptized an 8 year old boy named H. He is wild. Like insanely wild. But it was a good experience. His parents are members but I don´t know if he would´ve been baptized without us inviting him to be and doing everything else. I wasn´t even supposed to baptize him, his dad was, naturally, but his dad didn´t want to for some reason. Pretty interesting baptizing someone in a pool. Different, but awesome.

The Brasilians down here aren´t Brasilians. They are Gauchos first. They really don´t like the rest of Brasil and jokingly want to be their own country. Kind of like Texas. I think I´m serving my mission in the Texas of Brasil.

Taught more investigators and we´re helping reactivate this amazing family. I want them to come back so badly. The weather down here is getting better. I´m told i will burn like crazy during the summer when it gets about 110 degrees. I agree. I will burn like crazy haha.

This work is progressing in Arroio dos Ratos. Glad to be apart of it.

Elder Holloway

And some more pictures