here are some pictures, finally !

The first is Luiz's baptism, from two weeks ago. From the left to right is João, his son, Ednaldo, family friend, the Bishop (herton) who baptised him, Luiz, his wife who was baptized last month, Elder Vasquez and Me. I think I got that right, I didn't see the picture.

Next is me and Elder Vasquez with our district t-shirts: Missão Brasil Belo Horizonte - Missão de Metas e Milagres (Brazil Belo Horizonte Mission - The Mission of Goals and Miracles. Sounds cooler in Portuguese)

And then me with a parrot in Paraopeba.

So lots of exciting things have happened. And lots of not exciting things.
Let's start on Saturday. Saturday night we went to our investigator Kesley's house. He's 12 and his mom doesn't want him to be baptized. He's Stanley's brother, the drug addict who got baptized, and went back to drugs and is now in rehabilitation. He goes to church every Sunday with us, and has been for a month. But she's afraid that he'll baptize and then fall away just like Stanely (although Stanley didn't technically "fall away" he was more like "forced away by the habit of drug abuse and his family who sent him to a farm to get off of drugs". He can still get confirmed when he gets back in March). On the bus home from Paraopeba on Saturday I felt that we should go visit him and ask his mom one more time for permission to baptize him. We planned a lesson on the bus and when we got back to Sete Lagoas we went straight there and started the lesson with her and Kesley. Before we started, Elder Vasquez had pulled Kesley aside and told him our plan, and at the end of the lesson, before I asked her to sign the slip, we prepared him to bear his testimony to his mom. The lesson went great, she was very interactive, made comments and is very understanding. When we touched on baptism though she started talking a bunch and already showed that she didn't want him to be baptized, but then she slowed down, looked at Kesley and said "but that's just my opinion, what's yours?" Elder Vasquez and I both got excited at this point and looked at Kesley for him to bear his testimony. He thought for a second and then said, "Well, I'd like to keep going to church a little bit more to get to know things a little bit more, and who knows, maybe I can be baptized sometime in the future." I wanted to punch him. He got scared of what his mom would say if he said the truth, and just said what he thought she wanted to her. We lost the Spirit, and all was lost. It was very disappointing.
But on Sunday we had Marcia, from Paraopeba, who was a firm baptism. I went there Sunday morning with the High Counselor and picked her up to go to church with us. She watched the meetings with us and then we all got in the car to go to Sete Lagoas for her to baptize. Marcia, by the way, is the same Marcia who ran away from baptism for fear of water. But she came back.
On the way to Sete Lagoas, I sat in the backseat, in the middle between Marcia and Marileine a member from Paraopeba who came to accompany Marcia. Halfway there, Marcia put her head in her lap and when we asked her what was wrong she said, with her head still in her lap, "headache," and just stayed in that position. She didn't want to stop for air or water or anything, she said to just keep going. After time, her positioning slowly changed so that her head instead of being on her own lap buried in her arms, rested on my lap buried in her arms. It was incredibly awkward, and I had no idea how to stop it. I didn't want to be rude, and I of course was conscious that she was having a bad headache so I just waited patiently. She didn't get up until 20 minutes later when we finally arrived in Sete Lagoas. The member who was seated in the front said that she looked back and saw me turn green, yellow, blue, red, and all sorts of neat colors, haha.
So we got to Sete Lagoas and Marileine stayed with Marcia while we prepared the baptism with the Bishop. Church had ended and everyone was in the sacrament room waiting for the meeting to start. My companion had already changed into his white clothes to do the baptism, and we were just waiting for Marcia to change into the baptismal clothing so that we could start. And so we waited. And waited. And waited some more. And she never came out of the bathroom. Finally, Rejane (the can opener woman who I love), the Relief Society President went in to talk with her to see what was going on . She was in the bathroom holding the clothes in her arms and crying. Rejane started talking to her about the church and her feelings to try and figure out what was going on. She told Marcia to pray about what she was about to do, and ask God to confirm for her that is was right, and then came out of the bathroom running telling us to hurry and pray for her to know.
Marcia came out of the bathroom and said that she didn't want to get baptized. We invited her into the Bishop's office to talk to her and see what had happened. It was Marcia, The Bishop, Rejane, and me and my companion. It should be mentioned that Marcia does not hear well, so we always have to talk a little bit louder than normal for her to hear us. And the Bishop has a tendency to speak very softly. He started talking with her and bearing his testimony about the church and how her life would change after her baptism, and lots of other good things. I think he must've talked for a solid five minutes, and then he looked at her and said, "what we want to know from you Marcia is, are you ready to make this covenant with the Lord?" And there was silence. Then she looked back and said, "what?"
"Are you ready to make this covenant with the Lord?"
"Sorry, I still didn't hear you."
So Rejane yelled in her ear, "DO YOU WANT TO GET BAPTIZED TODAY, OR DO YOU WANT MORE TIME TO PREPARE??"
"oh, I want to wait."
And that was that. We gave her money to get a bus back to Paraopeba, and sent everyone home to eat lunch. It was tragic, really.
I almost cried.
Then on Monday we spent the whole day waiting for President Parrella to call us and tell us who was going to be transferred. Except he failed to mention to everyone that the new system is, "whoever doesn't get a call can just assume that you're not going to be transferred." So we waited all day anxiously for the phone call that never arrived. Finally, at 8 o'clock at night, we found out that he had finished the calls, and that no one was going to be transferred. So I am staying her in Sete Lagoas for six more week. Six. More. Weeks. Possibly twelve, who can tell? I was devastated. I wanted so badly to go to a new area. In my whole mission I've only worked in Sete Lagoas and Belo Horizonte. There are 10 other zones that I could have gone to. But, I stayed here. Again. Oh well.
Then, after all of this disappointment and devastation, on our way home Monday night, an investigator saw us in the road and went over to say hi. When I stopped to greet him, a bomb from above fell and covered my shoulder, my back, my backpack and got a little bit in my hair. I should have been more careful, I had seen all of the pidgeon poop on the ground where we were standing under the tree. I think it was God's way of saying, "See? Things could always be worse." Thanks.
It was the perfect way to end my perfect weekend.
Ah, here are the latest Paraopeba experiences: On Sunday, when I blessed the sacrament, as I was kneeling saying the prayer the four year old son of one of the members ran over to the table and stuck his hand in the bread tray to try and steal some bread. I grabbed his hand and we battled while I continued saying the prayer. By the time the prayer was done, he had returned to his seat.
Then Marileine, the lady who went to Sete Lagoas with us that day, got up to give her talk. The talk was nice, minus comments like, "I think all of the churches are led by Jesus, ours just happens to be the true one." Then at the end, she closed in the name of Jesus Christ, and said "now, to finish, I'd like to pray. May I?" No one argued, so she stuck out her arms towards the heavens and said this half-Mormon half-evangelical prayer, that used the phrase "in the name of Jesus" a lot. It was entertaining, at least.
Well, I think that's all the news for this week.
I love you guys, and will be home in three months.
-Elder Sisco

This week we experienced one of the biggest miracles of my mission. Luiz, Rosa's husband (who we baptized two transfers ago - her son is on his mission, left in may), was baptized. We ate lunch at Regina's house on Friday who is Rosa's visiting teaching companion, and Rosa was there. They said that Luiz commented that he was contemplating being baptized, he just didn't know when. He goes to church every Sunday and is keeping all of the commandments, he just needed to be baptized. We marked to go visit him that very night. After lunch, we started a fast specifically for him. Regina said she would prepare a message about temples and eternal families and then would pass it to us for us to challenge him for the baptism.
That night, at 7:30 we all went there and sat in their living room with Luiz, Rosa, Regina, João (their 14 year old son who's also a member), me and Elder Vasquez. We started by watching Together Forever, that old, cheesy church film. It brought the Spirit, and then Regina talked about eternal families and temples and then passed the lesson to us. I talked about what a blessing being sealed to my family was, and talked about all the blessings that they would receive when they are sealed together, and then said "but in order for that to happen, everyone needs to do their part. In order to enter into the temple, everyone needs to be a member of the church, and we'd like to invite you, Luiz, to become a member of the church by being baptized on Sunday." He evaded the question and changed the subject. Then I asked again, and he evaded the subject again. Then there was silence and Regina said, "Lu, the Elder asked you a question." And he said, "what's the question again?" and I said, "will you be baptized on Sunday so that your family can be sealed in the temple when Felipe gets home from his mission?" And he sat, and thought, and then said, "yes." Then everyone jumped out of their seats and hugged and it was a marvelous experience.
Our bishop baptized him after church on Sunday, it was great. We took lots of pictures. I have a stronger testimony of the power of the fast.
That's the biggest news of the week.
We also had our first interviews with the new president on monday. The interview was different, but really good. He's a very spiritual man. He's changing lots of things in the mission.
Last night we did visits with Junior, the 18 year old that Elder Martinez and I baptized. He's dating a member and is already excited about his mission. He will be eligible in July of 2010. He said if he doesn't leave the country he wont go haha. I'm going to give him some ties. One of my mission goals was to baptize a future missionary, so I'm really excited that he's really excited.
Next week is transfers, I'll probably be transfered out of here and to my last area.
Three months left!
Love,
Elder Sisco

We found Stanley, the investigator that ran away. He fell to the power of drugs again, and sold his brother's bike and his cell phone for more, so he was afraid to come home for fear of his brother.
Today he went to a rehabilitation clinic where he will stay (it's like a farm in the middle of nowhere) for the next seven months. Which means that he will not be confirmed and will have to be re-baptized when he gets out. I'll have to leave a post-it note on the wall or something for the Elders that will be here in March.
Marcia, the woman from Paraopeba that was supposed to be baptized on Sunday fled from us. I went there with a member in his car on Sunday morning. We went to get her at her house and she answered the door and was ready to go already, we didn't even have to wait for her. We went to the church/house where we have the meetings and she watched the sacrament meeting and then in the interval before Gospel Principles she came up to me and said "I'm just going to run back home to invite my niece to the baptism and grab the things you told me to bring to the baptism (towel, sandals, etc.)." I, suspecting nothing, said "that's fine, we'll pass by your house to pick you up and then we'll all go to Sete Lagoas together for the baptism." She agreed. When church ended (in Paraopeba it's only 2 hours), we went to pick her up and her mom said that she had left and that she said she didn't want to be baptized anymore. We went to the house where her mom said she had gone, and the people there said she had just left. We're going back this week to see what happened.
It's difficult to work in two areas. Everyone who gets baptized from Paraopeba has to go to Sete Lagoas, because there's no baptismal font in Paraopeba. It's rough.
So, my birthday was yesterday. For lunch the members whose house we ate at made a special meal (beans, rice, french fries, and these parmesean chicken things - excellent. I loved it) and then at night we had an appointment at Rosa's house, the lady who Elder Martinez and I baptized last transfer. Turns out that it was a surprise party, and her husband was doing a churrasco (barbecue) for us, with all of my favorite meats. It was awesome. He also said that he's going to be baptized. Probably next Sunday. All in all, it was a blast. I think I ate cake in four different houses. By the time we got home, I was dead from having eaten so much during the day.
Elder Rodrigo (remember him?) sent me a really expensive cologne called Carpe Diem from some perfume store called Boticário. I've never heard of it, but my companion said it's really expensive. I don't even use cologne, but I guess I can start now. Anyway, that was neat.
Today we played soccer, and a bunch of our investigators went. Soccer is the best integration tool that exists in Brazil.
Love,
Elder Sisco