Maracanau, Brazil - The countdown begins

Until Mother´s Day! And then my birthday! The best month has arrived. So we haven´t heard anything about Mother´s Day yet………. but we´ll more than likely get to call you guys a day or two before to mark when we´ll Skype. I think it´ll be the same time that we Skyped on Christmas. I think it was 6 pm here? 4 pm there. But I´ll call you guys to let you know! I´ll try the home phone first, then Mom's cell, then Dad's. So… be prepaaaaaaaaared! :)

Well, transfers happened. And… Sister Carvalho was transferred! :( You guys, I only have 4 weeks here!!!!!! I arrived a week into the transfer because of an emergency and the transfer was only 5 weeks long! I´m a bit nervous to be taking the area over and showing my new companion, Sister Costa, the ropes but it should be good. We´re teaching so many great people and have lots of great things coming up. Sister Costa is from Acre (north Brasil) and is pretty new on the mission! She only has 4 months and this is her second area. She´s been in her first area until now. She was super sad to leave, of course, but I hope she´ll learn to love this area as I've come to.

Sooo a few things that I forgot about in last week's email:

We had a game night thing in the church last Wednesday and it was pie in the face..? That´s the exact translation but I know the name in the English is different…. I just can´t remember it right now. But yeah, we had questions and whoever answered first and got it right smashed a “pie” in the face of the other. It wasn't actually pie though, just whipped cream on a small plate haha but it was fun! I only got a pie in my face one time haha the other times I won ;)

Last week I made pancakes for me and Sister Carvalho and ate them with maple syrup that I still have. It´s heaven. Thank you a million times. :)

Annnd last Sunday (not yesterday) I had some friends from Messejana visit me!! A sister in our ward, Boneca. Tamile, a “youth” (she´s 22), and my recent convert, Rodrigo!! He said that Leko, Adeline, and Aizaki all really want to see me and that they all really miss me. :) I love those guys!!

Now onto this week:

This week for game night in the church we had a movie night! We watched The Errand of Angels and everyone loved it! It captures the mission life pretty well haha

This week we had lunch with Tcharlly and Lindenburg and they took us to eat….

TEX-MEX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You guys, when I entered the restaurant I turned into a little girl. They had a wall that had a map of Texas and Mexico and there was written, Austin!!!! They also had other maps of Texas before parts of it were sold to Oklahoma and whatnot. We ate QUESADILLAS and SHRIMP TACOS!!! Yup, I ate every bit of the shrimp tacos and it. was. heaven. Do y'all know how long it´s been since I've eaten tortillas?? TOO LONG! It was so great and I loved every minute of it! Then they took us to this cookie store that literally has the best cookies I've ever tasted!!!!! The chocolate is so melty like when you bite into a pizza and the cheese…. drags? How do I describe that? I don´t know. But yeah, the chocolate in these cookies does the same thing! I asked how many stores they have and they said, just this one!!!! JUST ONE!!! It´s literally the cutest little store. We took pics on Sister Carvalho´s camera so I don´t have them :( but look up Cookie Mania! Fortaleza on google. It´s adorable. I told them I´m from the United States and that these are the best cookies I've ever tasted!

Also I´m collecting the Olympic coins here. There are 17 total and I have 12 as of now! The last 5 are the rarest so... I hope I´ll be able to find them!! I´ll send y'all a pic of my collection.

Other than that it´s been a great week with even more miracles. I´m loving this time I have to be a missionary, to spread our message with everyone I come in contact with :) Thanks for all y'all's support, love, prayers, thoughts, and know that I pray for you all as well!!!! 

Until Sunday!!!! I´m so excited to see your beautiful faces!!!!!!

Love and miss you all!!!!!

- Sister Parks