Week 3 - CTM - Have Great Joy and Be Exceedingly Glad - Sister Bido

Eu sou Brasilhetta

So this was a good week full of ups and downs. Mom, I wrote a long letter with detail so I’ll send that to you when I go to the cookie store in a few hours.

I want everyone right here and now to stop thinking about themselves and their feelings and their worries and do something for the Lord. Do not ever worry about me or fret or involve me in anymore of your worries please. I AM IN THE LORD’S HANDS. He puts all of his trust in me to spread His love and His gospel, and I give Him the same trust back. So you should too. And for the sake that I want and need to strive to be exactly obedient, please don’t inform me of worldly things going on because I am fully focused on the work of the Lord and salvation of others. OF COURSE I WANT TO KNOW ALL ABOUT YOUR LIVES THOUGH!!!!! So that stuff is fine :) This email is going to be a short one, but I just want you to all know that I love you. I have been blessed with a beautifully spirited family and I will always remember that. Sometimes remembering that is the only thing pushing me into the next day.

I’ve struggled this week with understand why and have to push myself to knowing that I have to accept things. We went proselyting Wednesday and each handed out 3 Book of Mormons. It was an adventure and an experience for sure.

We finally took public transportation. The buses are skinny and tall, like the Harry Potter trolley and the driving here is 89 times crazier than Cali and Idaho combined. My language is coming along pretty fine for this to be my 4th week here. My tan is gone, so sad. OH Sara! It’s called the ctm here because of how you say MTC, the Portuguese grammar is different. We only leave here on PDays which is today. I can get mail every day except Sunday and can only send on pday. We also just got 2 new members added to our family district here from Provo!

Maple doesn’t translate over to Portuguese apparently, they just say maple when they feel the need to use it. We had another really awesome devotional Thursday morning about Alma. He was rejected by the people after commanded to preach to them, but he didn’t give up because the Lords trust for him never changed. 90% of your good ideas come from the Holy Ghost, IF you’re keeping the commandments. I sent Emanuel a letter, someone tell him to check his email. Christ was the greatest man to ever walk this earth and live and if you don’t know that right now you need to find that out for yourself. He had no degree, yet he was called Teacher. He had no slaves and was called Master. He was crucified, and did no wrongs. He was behind tomb for 3 days, and yet HE LIVES. 

Be looking for the letter I’m sending my mom about the details. Remember that I love you, God loves you, and His will is infinite; important compared to yours. Humble yourselves and Trust in The Lord Thy God. 

Paz e bençòus con todo meu amor, 

Sister Bido (and my blog is irmajustine.blogspot.com if i ever miss an email to you!)

P.S.

Read 3 Nephi 12:10-12 to prepare yourself. I love you and I love being a missionary. Because I have been given much I too must give, and because much is given much is always expected.  My whole heart is in this and no it’s not easy at times, but President Swenson said that I can be perfect at saying a prayer and perfect at bearing my testimony, and that will make me a missionary with perfection. I don’t have Cathy’s email but tell her thank you for the letter, it made me smile. I love every one and knowing you all love me gives me endless happiness. I’m the only one in my district that is getting mail right now and I think it’s sad to some of them, so if anyone feels up too, I would love a heartfelt letter that I can read to all of them about support or whatever!  (I love you mom and dad, thanks again for the cookies from last week. I now have 10 people in my district so that’s cool. We were nervous about having new fam members but they’re slowly getting used to us. Love ya mean it, talk to you next week!

Sister Bido's Picture Album

Week 2 - CTM - Burdens and Charity - Sister Bido

Okay emailing is the most stressful part of my week. I haven’t read any of my emails in my inbox because I don’t have time to read them and respond. Sorry.

Okay so last Friday was our first pday and we went to the Sao Paulo temple, afterwards we got a free cookie from this cookie place and walked around. We have a 6 block radius to walk around on pdays, it’s pretty cool. People spit rapid fire Portuguese at us and I just smile and keep walking because I have no idea what’s being said. Oh well. So the highways are always crammed with traffic. We don’t take public transportation because we only go to the temple. We take charter buses. There are people walking in between cars on all the roads selling selfie sticks and bug zappers and bottles of water.  This morning on our way to the temple we saw a Brazilian military combat truck thing with guards riding on the back of it.

Sunday was cool. We have church in the building. It’s the same. We watched a movie after church, this week it was a testament movie on the doctrine of Christ and was so powerful. The Sunday school class is my fav. I was having a really bad past few days and president Swenson teaches, so at the end of class he said he wasn’t going to ask anyone to say the prayer because the spirit was directing him to someone already. Next thing I know he is standing beside me saying, sister will you answer the spirit and close this meeting for us? And so I did. Later after devotional that night I told him my experience and how God had used him to answer one of my prayers and that was a really special, powerful moment. He said if you stay close to the spirit, you find how important it is because you never want to be the reason someone didn’t get an answer to their prayer.

Segunda Feira - We had chicken patty sandwiches for dinner.

We had a lesson with Jane and it went pretty well. I’m understanding Portuguese a lot better and speaking a whole lot better. I can still understand it way better than speaking it.

Terça Feira - we had a HORRIBLE lesson with Jane. We taught Jessica later that day about the plan of salvation because she lost both of her parents, so we’ve been having a really hard time with her. Good news is she loves missionaries!

Our instructor bore her testimony of the gift of tongues in ENGLISH!!!! That was so awesome. She said that if she ever says another word to us in English, it will only be because something is terribly wrong. Even the natives are told to never speak to us in Ingles, SEMPRE Portuguese only.

Btw we sleep with our windows open every night and there is never any bug problems here in the CTM.  Cockroaches on the ground floor only, no biggy.

We had another devotional that night and Elder Hale concludes with Keep Your Heart Full of Hope like the Army of Heleman.

Quarta Feira - Extremely frustrating.

It was good, all my days end up being good. Sister Robinson arrived from Provo so that was exciting to see a face from home! We have exercise 5 nights a week and we always play volley for the entire hora. We were saying a district prayer later that night after our planning and we made a bet that if anyone yawns or laughs during the prayer (long story) then they have to pay every person 2 reas. Sister Cannon was praying and Elder Davis has zoned out and randomly says amen in it, so we all lost it.

Quinta Feira - We had waffles for breakfast, which deff beats the everyday ham and cheese sandwich and banana we have every other day. The syrup is so weird though that it actually makes the waffle gross, so we only eat them because it’s something new. For lunch we had 3 diff kabobs, all with diff meats on them. and you know how we have rice and beans for every meal, well this time NO BEANS. just rice. That’s like Adam without Eve or your mac without its cheese. And for dinner, we had chicken noodle soup!!!!!!! Most exciting part of the week by far. And also we had these pieces of chicken that tasted so similar to Chick-Fil-A. All the Americans were celebrating like crazy pretending it was chicken minis.

At 9:30 every night we have snack. It’s usually Twinkies and they are really gross. I’ve now lost a total of 3 kilos since I’ve been here. There are 4 beds in our room as well as a bathroom and shower. We have 2 Brazilian roommates, but right now we don’t have any because ours just left out into the field. It was a tearful night when they left because we had gotten really close in 2 weeks, even though they don’t speak any Ingles. Last Sunday, our district had a really spiritual moment and we sat in our classroom and opened up and we were all bawling for a good hour. Afterwards, we had a rock papers scissors tournament. I came in 8th out of the 8 of us. YAY I’m the number 1 loser!!!!!

So typing this email is so stressful because I have 45 minutes, and these computers are so slow it takes 10 for it to load.

On our way back from the temple this morning, I was looking out of our bus window and saw a little boy and his older brother walking on the highway where a man was selling water bottles. His little brother grabbed one and opened it and started drinking it and the guy immediately grabbed for his wallet to try to find money to pay for it. The seller patiently waited and smiled at the little boy and played with him while the older brother searched every pocket for 2 reas. He found 1 coin which is just 1 real and the seller accepted it and hugged the older brother. It was the saddest, but sweetest most charitable looking sight I’ve witnessed. I wanted to throw my wallet off the bus to him, but our windows don’t open. So my point is, be nice to people.  I have the burden of so many people on me because I have to learn Portuguese to be able to help these people of the Lord in Sao Paulo. But I have recently had a change of heart and just started accepting the burdens that get thrown upon me. This is my job, and I love it. I love serving my savior, because I love my Savior. This language is insanely hard, but I’m progressing really fast and I know that it is only through the power and authority of Christ that I am doing so.

Mom - if you’re sending me a package, cool. I want peanut butter in it and a roll of toilet paper. these people here use like this weird Kleenex stuff and it’s not even in a roll so it’s weird and awkward.... peanut butter because its too expensive here and hardly any of the natives had ever had it.

I almost forgot, today this guy told my companion to be a fish, which is slang here for just relax. sooooo funny! I love you all, the church is true and the book is blue. Sorry about all my typos and grammar stuff, but I’m loving Brazil. I know my purpose here and I love that too! Até logo!

Love,

Sister Bido

Alma 26:12

My address for the next 4 weeks...

Sister Justine Bido

Brazil Sao Paulo West Mission

Brazil Missionary Training Center

Rua Padre Antonio D'Angelo, 121Casa Verde

CEP 02516-040 Sao Paulo-SP Brazil

 Sister Bido's Picture Album (select the picture to bring up the album)

Week 1 - CTM - The Journey of Sister Bido

So, first thing first- as missionaries and representatives of the church, we do not address the Sisters as Irma. We are still Sisters due to the fact that in Catholic church the nuns are Irmas so we cannot get that confused.

Anyway, the first three days were the roughest. Not a single one of our classes are in English, they are all in Portugeuse so it was insane trying to figure out what page we were even on in whatever book it was they were wanting us to be in. I don't remember a play by play of every day because all our days run together. We wake up at 6:30, and go to sleep at 10:30pm.

Also, we started teaching an investigator last Friday named Maria. She is committed to baptism and is on vacation to Europe right now. We are struggling teaching Maria due to the fact that our Portuguese sucks, but whatever. As of yesterday, we have a new investigator named Jessica. When we taught her yesterday, our lesson didn't exactly go as planned. We were teaching the Restoration of the Gospel and Jessica asked a question about why it was important to follow God's commanmdment to be baptized if she was already living a happy life. So me, not very good in the language, experienced the true gift of tongues in that moment. I bore my testimony to her of the love that our Savior has for us and the power of prayer. I don't remember everything I said in it because I didn't know I knew those words. My companion and I were in tears and so was Jessica and she promised she would pray to know if getting baptised was something she needed to do. 

Also, I wrote a song in Portuguese so as soon as I make a video of it I will email it to you so you can make me famous by sending it viral.

Today is our pday and we just got back from the temple. PEOPLE DRIVE THEIRCARS ON THE SIDEWALKS WHENEVER THEY WANT AND ALSO THERE ARE PARKING SPOTS ON THE SIDEWALK. So yeah, pray that I don't get hit by a car please. I pray every night that me being here blesses all of you back home and I have an insane amount of faith that it will.

I also found out that the CTM is in my mission, which is absolutely awesome.

My district here is perfect, seriously it's like my tiny family here. Sis Namauu,Sis Cannon , Sis Lewis, Elder Davis, Elder Hayemore, Elder Light,and Elder Lake.  Last week we had almost 7 hours of free study time without an instructor everyday so we goofed off a lot.

Sunday night we had a really inspirational devotional led by the CTM president.  It was in Portuguese too of course, but they gave us headphones and listened to an English translator. Basically, this time right now does not belong to me anymore. I don't belong to myself. It doesn't matter that I have a headache and only slept 4 hours last night. It doesn't matter that a weird bug bit my hand and it swelled to 6 giant inflated marshmallows, because this is the Lord's time. I belong to him. And this is his mission, so I will not waste it and I will not complain. (and no mom I don't know what kind of bug it was, and yes I'm okay, and no I dont have malaria or yellow fever). 

The food here is so awesome, but so weird. I've lost 2 kilos here, whatever that means. I'm learning so many things about my purpose here and so many important teachings and understandings of the gospel. the coolest part about these halls is that the spirit never leaves. You can walk to the bathroom and stand in there and just feel the spirit radiating through the walls! It is SO awesome and I wish every one could experience this. We have 2 Brazilian roomates who absolutely love me. One of them was trying to dress me in her clothes instead of mine this morning! They help us out with learning phrases and pronunciation so that is pretty awesome.

We only have 45 minutes to email so it's stressful trying to think of everything over all this time in just one little email. We have rice and beans for every meal except breakfast. I don't eat breakfast here, it's some weird porridge so I just grab a banana or an apple. It was The Day of Children here one day this week! Monday was the holiday and the CTM was decorated and they gave us a yummy bag of chocolates. They always have 2 different meats for lunch and dinner, usually chicken and pork or fish and pork.  The desserts here are all extremely weird and I dont like any of them. I'm sorry this email isn't the best, but I'm slowly learning the language. I can understand fourteen times better than I can speak, so my understanding is pretty good. 

Tell Rachel and Joey that I'm terribly sorry, but what an amazing and exciting thing that they will be able to raise her with The Lord holding their actual hands. 

It's been a really rough week adjusting but I am truly enjoying myself. I know the Lord blesses me each and every day and I've really opened my eyes to this. Each hard day I endure ends with the perfect inspiration and motivation that I need to push me through the next day and be okay. Also, the email page here won't let me email my email group so that it's a problem for now.

Mom make sure my friends have my email please! And thank you for all you are doing to support and love me, you and dad are the best and I don't think I'll ever be able to express my love and gratitude enough to my Heavenly Father for the earthly parents he has blessed me with. Remember that every day is a blessing and the cup of water in your hand is just as much of a blessing as the clothes on your back and the bed you sleep on.

I love you all so much. 

P.S.Yes I'm tracking actual investigators. [IN PORTUGUESE]. Times up just about, talk to you next week! I miss you all so much and am so thankful for all your support.

Love,

Sister Bido

Alma 26:12

My address for the next 5 weeks...
Sister Justine Bido
Brazil Sao Paulo West Mission
Brazil Missionary Training Center
Rua Padre Antonio D'Angelo, 121Casa Verde
CEP 02516-040 Sao Paulo-SP Brazil

Sister Bido's Picture Album (select the picture to bring up the album)

Arrival day at the Sao Paulo CTM!!!! We just got an email!!!!!

We were so happy to actually get to hear from Justine today!!

On 10/7/15, Greetings from Brasil!!!!!!! Sorry I didn´t call in Atlanta, I fell on the moving stairs and my bag dropped and I flashed my G´s to everyone but it´s all good. The flight to Atlanta was really quick and quiet. Getting through Atlanta was surprisingly easy so that was good. But it was extremely far away so by the time I got to my gate, I saw an elder and we sat and talked for 2 minutes. His name is Elder Davis and then I went to the bathroom while he watched my carry on bag. So yes, I was using him so I didn't have to carry my bag all the way back to the bathroom with me.

Turns out I was right about being the only sister on the plane... and there were 3 elders. Elder Davis and I were sat beside each other and he is exactly like Austin (Pappas)!!!! It was so comforting because I felt a little at home except that he was crying about leaving his girlfriend so that was funny and random.

Anyways, I don´t have a lot of time. I´m here, I´´m safe! My companion is Sister Namauu!!!!!!! This place is so foreign and cool looking I know I´m gonna love it! Well I love you goodbye! Tell everyone I love them and that I am officially a foreign plane traveler so I´m pretty cool.

It´s lunch time though and I haven´t eaten in forever so Chow!!!

Oh and btw Pday is on Friday, but we arent sure if it will get to be this friday since we arrived today. I LOVE YOU!!!!!!

OH!!! This is important, for breakfast when we got to the CTM they fed us pieces of turkey and pieces of cheese and some soup stuff? WEIRD SO WEIRD

okay bye i love you all.

oh mercy, one more thing! we can´t send pictures in the CTM... bummer.

okay bye love you lunch is calling me.

So a side note, Sister Bailey Namauu is a friend that she has met online during this time of preparation for her mission so I know that she is very excited and also comforted. So as I was getting prepared to post, I received a wonderful email from her mission President Swanson with a PICTURE!!!! Yeah!!!! He also reported that there is a live in physician who's wife is a nurse and the food is very plentiful. Also hand written letters are highly encouraged. Forgive me, I've never been a blogger and will eventually figure out how to post this photo as well!!
Love you all and as Justine's mother I am also very grateful for all of your love and compassion.

From the MTC President...
Dear Parents,
Sister Swensen and I are very happy to let you know that your missionary has arrived safely at the Brazil Missionary Training Center. What a great joy and privilege it is to greet each missionary as they begin their missionary experiences with us. We will surely take good care of your missionary.

The missionaries now have companions and are settled into their rooms. They are assigned to a district with capable and caring instructors for language and lesson study. Their branch presidents and wives, will meet them this Sunday. These wonderful couples are richly blessed as they work with, motivate, and interview the missionaries assigned to their branch.

The MTC has a full-time live-in physician to care for their health needs. He is assisted by his able wife who is a nurse. We are also happy to report that the cafeteria food is plentiful, healthy and very good.

Your missionary will be able to e-mail home on Preparation Day after a morning at the Temple. This will be either Wednesday or Friday, depending on individual assignments.

Your missionary is about to make an eternal difference in the lives of many others. President Lorenzo Snow said: “There is no mortal man that is as interested in the success of an elder when he is preaching the Gospel as is the Lord who sent him to preach to the people who are the Lord's children". We love these missionaries as if they were our own. We will watch over them carefully to ensure they are ready for a wonderful missionary experience after the rewarding time they will have in the MTC.

We thank you for preparing such a wonderful representative of the Lord.

President Robert Swensen and Sister Julie Swensen