Self-Analysis and the Thankgiving that isn't Thanksgiving

There are certain things I have come to realize during this time I have been here in Brazil. One of which is that I have something in common with the Brazilian culture. In this certain case, that's not a good thing. haha

In general, saying that you will do something here, doesn't mean you will actually do it. This is something I regularly do (man, I REALLY can't stand that I do this). On the other hand, it's kind of nice in a really wrong way. Some examples: "Yeah, I'll send you that email tomorrow morning". "Sure, when I get home I'll call you" "I'll pay you back as soon as I get paid". These are the type of things that are said here that you can completely get away with not doing. Hardly anyone will get angry with you because it's such a normal thing. It's annoying that this is so common here; but at the same time I also do this exact thing, just not as much. It's  all so comfortable. (not in the good sense of the word) P.S. my mom would label all this as flakiness and very buggy ;)

Well, today is Thanksgiving in the good ol' U.S.A. They don't celebrate it here in Brazil obviously. Still, I have learned to be more grateful living here in Fortaleza than I have ever been in my life.

 So without further ado, here are some things I am thankful for:

My family that loves and supports me even though they are thousands of miles away. Love you guys.
My job. So thankful to have the opportunity to provide for my family.
My amazing wife, Géssica, who loves and cares for me, and who works so hard every day.

Things that I took for granted in the U.S. that are blessings:

Shower heads. (never though I'd put this on a thanksgiving list)
Cars. Man. I miss my car. Such a luxury.
Pillows. no comment.
Peanut butter
Being surrounded by people who live the gospel.
Living in a safe neighborhood
Air conditioning
My parent's house (enormous compared to the houses here)
Pantry that always had food (magically)
Dish washer, and washer and dryer (technology is amazing)
Libraries (basically nonexistent here)
Trees

I could go on, but you get the idea. There are so many little things that I never thought of as blessings. I am grateful for this experience to be down here in Brazil. I wouldn't trade this past year for anything. I've learned so much.

Oh, and one last blessing I am grateful for. This morning I looked at my email (site hahaha couldn't resist Dad) and I had received an email saying that the Feds have starting working on Géssica's visa!!!!! Finally. Also, that within 60 days we should have the second Notice of Action. Which means after that, there's just one more part of waiting and then the interview. Happy Thanksgiving!!

New House, New Calling,....

and a New Member of the family! JUST KIDDING! hahahaha. Well, just kidding about the last part. However, we did move into a new house and both Géssica and I were released from our callings within the last 3 weeks. Our Bishop switched up quite a few callings in our wards. I am no longer the Y.M. President. I was kind of sad to be released, because I had really become attached to the boys. I got called to be the new Ward Mission Leader though. My dream calling. Pretty exciting right? One of the Elders in our area is from Holladay, Elder Christensen. He's a nice guy. The other (Elder Etchichury) just arrived in the area and is from the south of Brazil. Also, Géssica was released as the Y.W. President and might be getting a new calling this coming week. We are both a little relieved as those two callings were super time consuming, but I expect that our new callings will require as much of our time as did the last two.

On to our new house!! The circumstances that made us move were less than pleasant but overall, we are very happy that we made the move. Our new house is on a central road, much different than our last which was in an alleyway. It is on the second floor of a building; on top of a hardware store. Much safer, and a lot less mosquitoes. (I had no idea how stressful mosquitoes could be) The only bad thing is the sound of the cars, trucks, buses, and motorcycles going by (since we're on a central road, and there are no sound enforcement laws here it's kind of rough) Other than that it's nice. Here's some pics:

I am still pretty busy teaching English. There are many opportunities to teach, I'm  grateful for that. Géssica is still working hard at her job. The phone company she works for just decided to change 80 employees' hours from the morning to the evening. So starting in December she will start around 3 in the afternoon and go until 9. We aren't sure how we feel about that yet...

Well, Christmas is coming up soon, but it sure doesn't feel like it here in Fortaleza. The weather is as hot as ever and I haven't heard any Christmas music yet. We are thinking about getting a tiny artificial tree, or maybe putting up some lights, but I guess we'll see.

I think that's about all the news that we have for now. I finally have a few topics in mind to write about so I'll probably post again within the next week. Love you all.

-Andrew aka The Boss

The Adventures of an English Teacher Pt. 1

Since I have started working as an English teacher down here, so many weird, funny, and cool things have happened to me. This is part one of those tales.

I was at a student's house about 2 hours away from my house. My class had just ended. It was now 8 p.m. Normally my boss picks me up and drops me off at the bus station. This night he had some appointments to attend to so he asked me to call a cab and he would pay for it. I realized as the class got over I didn't have any taxis phone number so I asked my student (who was a extremely wealthy person) if he
knew a number to call a taxi and he said he didn't but that maybe the doorman would know. He talked to the doorman and the doorman didn't know one either. So my student offered to give me a ride to the bus station. I politely refused but he insisted. So he told his security to follow and and we proceeded to hop in his bulletproof BMW. SO COOL. He dropped me off at the bus station and I ended getting home around 10:30 p.m.

Moral of the story: I rode in a bulletproof BMW with a guy that had his own bodyguard.

Sort of looked like this

Last Friday night I was coming back from my class at the college and was at the bus station waiting for the bus to come with 3 friends. While we were in line, a guy comes out of nowhere and asks very quietly if the bu we were waiting for went to a specific part of Fortaleza.  Sounds pretty normal right. Not exactly... He was dressed in all-black, with several face piercings, had an accent like he wasn't from Fortaleza and you could also tell he was gay. However, it's not uncommon to see people from all walks of life in a bus station. That's not the weird part, I'm getting there. He then asks my friend Eder to hold his backpack because it's "heavy" and he has to go buy something on the other side of the bus station. Handing your backpack to a complete stranger and leaving? Weird. As soon as he was out of sight one of my friends started to freak out because she thought maybe there was a bomb inside, or maybe he was wanted by the police or maybe...etc. So we just kind of looked at the backpack until Eder decided to go looking for the Goth. Meanwhile the girl thought she saw him leave the bus station and was completely freaked out. Eder came back and the guy was right behind him. The Goth then asked "Do you want to see what's in my backpack?" and we were all like " uhhh..." but he opened it up anyways. He asked the girl to hold his phone and she was so freaked out that she didn't want to hold it hahahaha. He reached in and pulled out a romance novel about vampires. He told us it was the best book ever written. By this time I'm thinking he is completely insane. As he gushes on about this book, a drunk, cross-dressing, homeless 45 year old gay guy comes up and asks for 80 cents. (I'm not sure why, he was very confused haha) The Goth says he only has 30 cents. This Crazy Ross says ok, and then starts to cry. The Goth then hands the C.R. a cigarette and the C.R. looks at cross-eyed it like he has never seen a cigarette in his life. The Goth is trying to teach him how to smoke and in the middle of this all I look at Eder and say to him in English. "This is the weirdest night of my life." The bus came right then and we all got in and went home.

Moral of the story: There are a lot of weirdos at bus stations.

The actual bus station from the story.

The Good Stuff

I promised a post about all the awesome things that I think Brazil has to offer....so here it is.

The food. Inexpensive. Fresh. Delicious. Different. Varied. In the north of Brazil the food is completely different from the northeast. The south is completely different from central Brazil and so on. I will never get the chance to try all the different varieties of food they have here. :) I could take all day and not be able to list all the different types of fruits that grow here too. Here are some examples of the exotic fruit that grows here:

This Jaca fruit kind of tastes like a banana.

Strawberry Guava (Abricó do Pará)

Soursop (Graviola)

Those are just a small sample of the dozens of fruits that are exclusive to Brazil.

Another nice thing is accessibility. (At least during business hours...good luck buying ANYTHING after 10 p.m.) If I need to buy something I can literally walk across the street and buy it. (soap, fruit, dog food, matches, water etc.)

This is probably the most authentic picture ever taken.

Besides the mini-stores seen above, At least once a week in the neighborhood there is an open-air market which sells everything from fresh fruits and vegetables to remote controls and pots and pans.


Beaches. Literally dozens of the best beaches in the world. Some are deserted, some are packed. All are beautiful.

Fernando de Noronha, PE- Brazil

The people. Almost every person I have come in contact with is happy to be alive. Brazilians are a very friendly people. In one of the cities I was in on my mission (Crato) we would knock on the door and people would greet us, instantly tell us to come in, and then offer us cake and soda pop. :) Of course not everywhere is like that in a country that is bigger than the continental U.S, but I would say that the majority of Brazil's people treat strangers like they are old friends.

I'm going to close with some awesome facts about Brazil. If you lived in Brazil instead of the U.S. you would use 84% less electricity. You would use 80% less gasoline. You would spend 89% less on healthcare (although the healthcare isn't the best so idk about this one haha) And last and possibly the best of all, you would have a 20% better chance of being employed. There's alot to like about Brazil. If you had a legit job here it would probably be as close to paradise as you can get.