In a Few Crazy Weeks!!

Olá family and friends,

How is everyone doing? I am doing really well here in Praia on the island of Santiago...that is right, I am no longer on the island of Sal. I also have not written the last week or so because things have been a bit crazy the last 2 weeks.

First, I got a little sick about two weeks ago. One night I was woken up by the most horrible chest pains ever. They lasted all night and by mid day did not go away. My heart rate was also really high. Long story short, I was told by the mission that I had to go to the hospital. This was on a Monday. By the end of the week, I still had pains and had one more visit to the hospital as well for more tests to be done. Turned out I just had an ulcer in my esophagus that was caused from some medicine I had been taking for the hives I had recieved on my scalp the week before. But because of the pain I was having, I had to be transferred out of Sal last week to the mission home in Praia. I was placed in a trio companionship with the two secretary sisters in the mission home when I arrived. But as of today, I have been cleared to leave the mission home and enter back into the field to continue my missionary work. However, I am still in Praia and still in a trio. My companions this last week were two American sisters, Sister Laimana (from Hawaii) and Sister Brooks (from Provo, Utah). They are both amazing and we got a long really well.

I am now in my new trio with two Sisters BOTH from Africa, Sister Macamo (from Mozambique) and Sister Lorenço (from Angola)! I have only been with them for about an hour now but they are both crazy (in a very good way) and both speak sooooooooo dang fast in Portuguese with HEAVY accents that are different then the Cabo Verdianos. So far our conversations have consisted a lot of them speaking into my face and me responding saying "Huh!?" over and over again. It is pretty funny. I love them both though but we definatly come from two different worlds...I love it!!!!! I am excited to be with non English speakers and hopefully I can continue to better my English even more so now that I am not serving with American companions. It will not be easy...but I am very much so looking forward to my time with the two of them.

I am still trying to adjust to Praia. It was good to be in the mission home for the week and be able to see my Mission President, President Neves, here and there a few more times. He only has two weeks left of being our mission president before his time is through and we receive a new mission president. The new mission president is going to be President Oliveira from Brazil. I am very sad to see President Neves leaves because he is incredible and works very hard. As mission president they not only have to be over all of us missionaries...but also over ALL of the members because stakes do not exist here. So he acts also as kind of what a Stake President usually would do. So they seriously have to do a TON here and President Neves has just done an incredible job. We will all miss him very much when he finally leaves here in the next few weeks.

Praia is also different because it is a much faster pace being here in the capital. I miss Sal A LOT. I got so close to the entire branch there and all of my investigators in such short time that it made it extremally hard to say goodbye. My last day there was last Sunday...so the last time I saw everyone was at church. They changed the closing song in Sacrament meeting to Till We Meet Again...and I am not going to lie, I definatly shed a few tears a long with a handful of the other members. It was really hard. BUT...all of Cabo Verde is great and now I just have to go out and start meeting more people again in a new area...starting today. I am looking forward to the new experiences that await me this transfer in this new area and with this new companionship.

Well, that is all of my time for this week. I love you all! Até proxima semana!

Com amor,