About My 2 New Companions: Sister de Souza and Valentina the Dog

HAPPY THANKSGIVING THIS WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH. Muito obrigada por tudo. Amo vocês!!!!

I am now serving in Rio Grande, in the area Jardim do Sol with Sister Stephany de Souza. We met all the trainers at once. (He interviews all of the verdinhos before placing them a trainer.) Apparently he planned on putting me with S. de Souza beforehand though because she says she received an email before she came to PA to pick me up that was addressed to both of us. She's from São Paulo, the fábrica of Brasil. She's been on her mission for 7 or 8 months now. Love her!💗 When Prez Cruz announced that she would be my companion, I was super happy because I liked her the most of the three Sister Trainers. She likes my genre of music, almost, doesn't like mousse de maracuja (but that's ok because I do and I eat it for her) and actually she just got an email that her dog died back home. That's not awesome. :( I have a lot of pictures of her to send when I can find my adapter. Hahahaha

My mission prez stresses obedience every time he speaks. Must be important to him.😉 It is such a blessing to be here. I love Rio Grande already!!!! Apparently, our area is the "celestial" area of the mission. I hope I do well here. We have a baptism planned for this weekend and hopefully two more next week! 

My favorite time of day is when we study. So much good stuff in there. I wish I could study more but we have so many investigators and less actives and recent converts that we have to visit. Today, we have 12 planned lessons and several back ups. We are BUSY. It has been raining for most of today. I haven't gotten pictures of our house yet- sorry. It's very South America. Better than I expected though!

God loves his children. (see D&C 122:7-9). I'm seeing very clearly 👀, because hindsight is 20/20, that the Lord has guided my life so much and this is why I haven't struggled very much. I'm 100% where I need to be right now. Anyway, I used past subjunctive correctly and I literally cried. 

There are a TON of dogs here. Apparently the dog-to-human ratio is 10 to 1. Hehehe. There are a lot of horses here too. Like, they chill in the streets with the dogs. It's kinda awesome. I have a third companion. It's a dog named Valentina.👅 She has literally followed us everywhere and waited outside houses that we entered. Haha I love it. 

I love you guys! I miss y'all like crazy but not too crazy because I won't be leaving here anytime soon of my own choice. In Portuguese, " I miss you" is "en sinto falta de voce" which literally translates to " I feel the loss of you". I like it. It's more meaningful to me. 

Miss you muito: En sinto falta de voce! Send me pictures when it snows. Ate mas!

Your wanna-be Brasileira,
Sister Hartman

PS- We go to a LAN house to email. I think I lost my SD card converter. This means that I can't send pictures *today. And possibly ever. Lol (*These are pictures she sent before.)

Official souvenirs anyone?

Selfies at the CTM

Last day with the District

 One last shot as we prepare to fly to our mission.

Leaving. On a jet plane. (Or a small commuter.)

Arriving to a welcome committee.

My New Companion- Sister de Sousa- waiting in the LAN house.

Fun Fact #1: I enter the field in 1 week...

Fun Fact #2:  Also my week is now the "oldest" in the MTC. Woo!!

I already talked to Bubs (I thought about him all day on his birthday.) and I'm cracking up because he mentioned that you think he's losing weight. HAHAHA!!! Y'all should come to brazil. Meat, rice, and beans, and a gelatinous thing for dessert every day. I'm surprised that I am still the exact same weight. Still feeling a little sick, but  in waves. Usually it's my fault. Like today I had 2 Mr. Cheney's cookies and a tartuguita (turtle chocolate candy thingy) and a brazilian version or chicken cordon bleu and a beef roast thing all in one meal (lunch). Still loving the rice. The beans I'm over cuz they're causing a few gastrointestinal issues, if you know what I mean. 😜

😒I wish I could be there to play soccer- it's banned for all missionaries in every Brasilian mission. The brazilians love soccer too much, dang it! Also, they're REALLY competitive. We're not even allowed to JUMP in basketball and volleyball here because Things have happened. We're not allowed to leave the CTM for atividade fisica. When we do leave the CTM, we have so many rules. For exercise, we are all required to run 5 laps on the (TINY) track and then I usually do sit ups and a minute long plank or 5 minutes of inferno (I'm getting stronger! I can do half a pull up now, so there.) 💪

I'm learning SO much. We have classes about how to teach and how to speak the language. I really love my teachers. Irmã Andrade is stellar. I feel bad for her because some are disrespectful and no. one. does the stuff we're supposed to do before her classes. We spend her class doing the stuff we were supposed to do. I have seen many blessings in my life BECAUSE I have been obedient. (Ok, ok, ok, I have had a *FEW slip ups, but I have since repented and am on the straight and very very narrow again). (*Yesterday, I got in trouble because I didn't super feel like running around the TINY courtyard in the rain with SB so I sat under an umbrella'd table with some brazilians and we were just chatting about life in portuguese, which was fantastic practice which I need, and I got in trouble for being "alone" with elders, even though I was still in sight and hearing of my companion at all times and we were literally surrounded by other missionaries.) Sometimes, it's really hard to be obedient.

Roommates: Sister Louisy Couto, serving in Sao Paulo Norte; her bf is serving in my mission (Porto Alegre Sul). Sister Vitoria Silva, serving in Goiania. They're really nice. I don't understand a word the say tho so I can't tell you much about them! 

One of my favorite sights is Sao Paulo from afar in the morning. There's so much beauty in an early morning skyline. I love Sao Paulo. Something cool about the temple is we do the sessions in Portuguese! (If you're wondering why I understand Portuguese better in some places than others, I couldn't tell you. I've been asking myself the same things and at times it's very frustrating!

There isn't enough study time in the day- I need and want more. It's hard because I have things I want to accomplish personally, but my study time is used studying for my investigators. This is the way it should be, but dang it. We learn so much about how to love here- the gist of it is that God loves his children SO MUCH and he needs us to do our part to bring all unto Christ, not just missionaries. Mosiah 18:8-10 talks about what we need to do as the Lord's people. I really like 1 Cor 15, I use it a lot in lessons. I use John 3:5,16 so often I have them memorized. When we teach, when we're doing what we're supposed to, we have the Spirit. It's amazing.  I love the Spirit here. It's exactly what I need and I LOVE IT. I LOVE PORTUGUESE. I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY.

Miss you guys a lot. Tell Andy good job and keep up the good work for me! Tell Bub to tell me all about his dates. Tell Dad to send me pics of the chicken coop when it's done. Sometimes, things happen and I'm just like "dang, I wanna tell mom" but then I forget because enough happens in one day here that happened in one week back home. I have already finished off a journal that I brought here. I hope I brought enough journals! (I have 1.5 more). That's all I got time for. They're kicking me off. Love you muito! Until next week!

xoxoxoxo

SIlliness

Us and some of the Brazilian Elders

CTM

Some Brazilian snacks

Sao Paulo

More snacks (Mom wants pictures of food!)

Me n Sister Couto

Me n Sister Andrade

Callings and Growth: LDS Missions

This is a posting by Morgan Hartman's mom, mostly because she's not here to speak for herself.



There are few times in a mother-of-a-teenager's (did I say that right?) life where the mom gets to speak for the daughter sans eye rolling, irritated huffs of annoyance or outright correction. This is, therefore, an opportunity! And, because she'll be away to Porto Alegre, Brazil for 18 months with limited electronic exposure, it'll be my pleasure to update you on her whereabouts, adventures and perhaps even struggles (with help from Heavenly Father, she'll work them out, we're sure.)

However, rest assured, Morgan (or I should say, "Sister Hartman", her moniker for the duration of her Brazilian stay), I will limit myself to just a few a la carte comments, but only when absolutely necessary. The rest shall be in her words with her sentiments and her point of view.

Unless I can't help myself. Just kidding, I can do it.

Presently, (I did say this whole posting would be from me, right?) Sister Hartman is in the Provo, MTC (Missionary Training Center) where she is getting religious and language training: she will be teaching about Christ and serving the people of greater Porto Alegre. She is expected to remain in the Provo MTC either for the whole 6 weeks of training or until she receives her visa, whereupon she'll go to Sao Paulo to complete her training there.

When did she decided to serve a mission you ask?  She had made some friends at BYU who spoke Portuguese. And Gigs (one of our nicknames for her), being the goal-setting type, decided she wanted to learn it too. When she graduated Duolingo (a free language learning app she used to teach herself Portuguese), she received a Portuguese Book of Mormon (thanks Carla Santana!) and started trying to read it. Meanwhile she had decided to start asking HF (The Big Guy upstairs) if she should go on a mission. She said that mostly, she couldn't get thru the verses without serious work, but one night she came across a scripture that she just understood. When she read it, she received an undeniable answer: Yes, definitely a mission!

In case you don't know, missionaries are called to serve by God in areas away from their home for either 18 months (female) or 24 months (male). While serving, missionaries are asked to dedicate their lives to being His hands. They do this by teaching about Christ, performing regular humanitarian service, and living the Gospel in a joyful way (that's the goal, anyway). In order to be most effective, missionaries are asked to put romantic relationships on hold while avoiding new ones, relinquish most time-wasting frivolous fun, postpone  educational pursuits, and continuously study Christ's teachings. It's a tall order and means we as families participate in sacrificing as well since contact is limited to weekly emails and letters and bi-annual calls or skyping with our kids. Not gonna lie, it's painful.

But, also r e w a r d i n g! How many parents are in the war against entitlement? Has gratitude ever been a problem? Humility? Generosity? Hard work? Self sacrifice? Self control? Goal setting/achievement? Empathy? Missions can help humans develop these traits and more. This is very often the outcome for these young adults focused in such outwardly ways. Although these are not the reasons we support her in this endeavor, these are the results. And what parent doesn't want their child to become a better human being??

So, even tho we mourn the loss of those 18 months and miss her terribly (it's only been 6 days!) we anticipate welcoming home a healthier (mentally, spiritually, and emotionally if not physically), happier, and wiser daughter who has learned to love and serve people of many types, along with their cultures, and who has a more intimate knowledge of God.

In the end, the price is worth it.

Now, I'm going to cease watering my pillow and practice gratitude and serenity. If she's working on things, I should too (dang it). See you soon, my girl. We're so excited for this growth opportunity and cannot wait til your return (and before then, our next letter!)

Hugs from,

The Mama