Castelo Branco

April 11, 2011 (Elder Abreu was transfered so I skipped ahead so everyone could read about his new area) but ya the news of the week. i did get transfered. i am down in the longest away part in our mission. it takes 5 hours by bus and three hours in a car which luckily i was able to drive down here. its castelo branco. it seems like a really cool city with some really nice people. my new comp is elder park. he only has one transfer so im finishing his training. and there are two elders staying with us in our house elder hatch who only has two transfers in the mission and he is training a new elder named maldonado. so president stuck me down here to be the ditrict leader and make sure everything goes well. haha cuz the other dupla will stay with us for a couple weeks and they are trying to find a house in covilha which is this little city that they are going to open up to missionary work. so we have to kind of help them out. its pretty cool and im excited. its a bit hotter here so im wearing all short sleeve for sure. apparently in summer it gets up there in the 100s so im not really looking forward to that but it seems like a really good area.

elder park seems like a cool kid. hes a little interesting but he knows the gospel well and talks pretty good for only one transfer. i do miss elder peck though we were great friends and we were really similar. ill see if i can send a picture of us.

as for the area we have a marked baptism so thats cool jorge and nadia. the only thing is that jorge has to quit smoking this week and hes not doing it so well so we will see if we can get him baptised. but nadia is good and shes really cool. shes a bit shy but nice. they have a kid together but they arent together and are just friends. but they went to church and their kids name is flavio which made me laugh and think of shawns name he always wanted to use. haha so thats them.

we also have fatima who i havent taught but i met her at church. she is brasilian and seems really nice but she is a prostitute but she says may 1st she can quit her job and she wants to have a better life and be baptised so we will see how that goes.

then we have this other family that we passed by catia and noberto who arent married but they are living together and they have 3 kids in the house and i dont think they are theirs together cuz they were both separated. but we have a lot of work to do with them. they have the desire to be baptised but they have a good amount of things that need to be resolved before that can happen. i know they have been investigating for a while so we will see what happens. but im really excited for this area.

i am sad to be leaving maia and all the people nani almost cried when i left. but i know the lord has a plan for me. the people seem pretty nice here as well. the accent is a little different here its kind of funny sounding. it reminds me a bit of madeira. but we we knocking the other day and found this guy from cabe verde and he let us right in and we taught him a lesson and gave him a book of mormon. he was way nice. he doesnt believe in god as a person just as a spirit of good but who knows it could be his time to hear the gospel so we will try in the coming weeks.

but anyways i think that covers just about everything.

oh ya heres my address.

Rua Frei Roque Espirito Santo
Nº3 1 frente
Castelo Branco 6000

so ya thanks a bunch mother for everything you do and i love you lots. hope you have a great week and i will talk to you later. love elder abreu